Travelodge to create 10,000 jobs

Under the £3.5bn plan, the company aims to open about 40 new hotels each year until 2020.

By the end of the expansion programme the group plans to have grabbed a 10% slice of the UK hotel market, taking in 20 million customers a year.

Travelodge will concentrate its programme in the greater London area as well as in Wales and Scotland.

The group said it had made the decision to expand as it believes the UK market is ripe for a revival.

"There is no doubt that the UK hotel industry will see a major phase of regeneration over the next decade," Travelodge's property director, Paul Harvey, said.

"The mid-market hotels are suffering from a severe identity crisis as they no longer offer real value to the customer".

The Travelodge group, which operates 291 hotels in the UK, Ireland and Spain, was bought by Dubai International Capital in a £675m private equity deal last year.

At the time the Dubai-based firm said it planned to make the group the UK's leading budget hotel operator by the 2012 Olympics.

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