The decision by a coroner to clear the tour operators of neglect over the murders of 30 British tourists on a Tunisian beach two years ago has left the bereaved families dismayed.

They are now suing the company, holding that it should have put more emphasis on Foreign Office travel advice for the country and ensured better security at the hotel where the lethal attack took place.

What happened at the inquest into the massacre raises important questions about holidays at a time of international terrorism, how a country is designated as unsafe for travel and what effect boycotting such places will have on local economies as well as security in the West.

Since the killings on the beach in Sousse in June 2015, there has been one significant attack in the country, in November that year, in which 12 members of the presidential guard died in Tunis. In that same period terrorists have struck a dozen times in Europe, killing more than 250 people, a large number of other plots, in addition, have been foiled.

But, unsurprisingly, British tourists are staying away from Tunisia, a drop of around 90 per cent since the attack. The government in Tunis, which has taken extensive security measures, a lot of it with UK advice, since Sousse, has asked the Foreign Office a number of times to drop its warning on travel to the country. These pleas have been turned down.

In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Show all 32 1 /32 In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia The coffin of Denis Thwaites is carried from an RAF C-17, which repatriated the bodies of eight British nationals killed in the Tunisia terror attack, at RAF Brize Norton near Oxford in Britain In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia The coffin of John Stollery is carried from an RAF C-17, which repatriated the bodies of eight British nationals killed in the Tunisia terror attack, at RAF Brize Norton near Oxford in Britain In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia The coffin of Elaine Thwaites, one of the victims of the terrorist attack, is taken from the RAF C-17 aircraft at RAF Brize Norton in Tunisia In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Hearses carrying the victim's of last Friday's terrorist attack arrive at Tunis Airport Getty Images In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia An RAF C17 transport aircraft arrives at RAF Brize Norton Airport in Oxfordshire carrying the bodies of 8 British people killed in the Tunisia gun attack Getty Images In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Ambulances carrying the victim's of the terrorist attack arrive at Tunis Airport Getty Images In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Armed police continue to patrol Marhaba beach in Sousse Getty Images In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia National guard members patrol at the beach near the Imperiale Marhaba hotel, which was attacked by a gunman in Sousse In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Military personnel attending to injured British nationals on board an RAF C-17 aircraft en route back to the United Kingdom, in Tunisia In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Military personnel attending to injured British nationals on board an RAF C-17 aircraft en route back to the United Kingdom, in Tunisia In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Holidaymakers lay flowers on Marhaba beach Getty Images In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Tourists pay tribute to the victims of the Sousse attack at a makeshift memorial on the beach at the Imperial Marhaba resort Reuters In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia The Home Secretary Theresa May pays her respects with her counterparts, France’s Bernard Cazeneuve, left, Germany’s Thomas de Maiziere, second left, and Tunisia’s Najem Gharsalli, in Sousse Reuters In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Two tourists pay respects to victims of IS attack on beach in Sousse, Tunisia Kenzo Tribouillard/AFP/Getty In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Many people remain unaccounted for and many of their relatives have taken to social media in the hope of obtaining information about those who are still missing (Getty) Getty In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia A boy holds a Tunisian flag at the spot on the beach where the attack took place Reuters In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia A man kisses a Tunisian flag at the site of a shooting attack on the beach in front of the Riu Imperial Marhaba Hotel in Port el Kantaoui, on the outskirts of Sousse In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia The front of the Marhaba hotel Getty In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Tunisian Ennahdha party member and former minister Houcine Jazir speaks with Belgium survivor couple Corman (R) and Claude Pesser after a mass shooting in the resort town of Sousse In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia The bloodstained belongings of a tourist are seen on the sand in the resort town of Sousse AFP/Getty Images In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia A broken glass window of the Imperiale Marhaba hotel is seen after a gunman opened fire at the beachside hotel in Sousse Reuters In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Blood stains cover the ground at the Imperial Marhaba Hotel in Sousse, Tunisia after mass shooting Fethi Belais/AFP/Getty In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Policemen patrolling the beach in front of the Riu Imperial Marhaba Hotel in Sousse where tributes have been laid to the dead AFP/Getty In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia People stand in silence next to flowers during a gathering at the scene of the attack in Sousse, Tunisia Getty In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Messages and flowers are left on Marhaba beach where 38 people were killed in a terrorist attack in Souuse Getty Images In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Police officers control the crowd while surrounding a man suspected to be involved in opening fire on a beachside hotel in Sousse, Tunisia In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Medics help an injured man in Sousse In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia A body lies on a street in Sousse In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia Members of the Tunisian security forces in an armoured vehicle patrol a street in Sousse In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia The beach where the massacre took place Lionel Tunisiano/Twitter In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia A general view of the deserted pool and deck chairs at the Imperial Marhaba Hotel EPA In pictures: Tunisia hotel attack Tunisia A woman looks toward a glass door shattered by a bullet at Imperial Marhaba Hotel EPA

Delivering the inquest verdict of unlawful killing, Judge Nicholas Lorraine-Smith described the conduct of the Tunisian police as “at best shambolic, at worst cowardly”. That is roughly what my colleagues and I, reporting on the murders in Sousse at the time, discovered. But we also learned how brave the staff at the hotel had been during the attack.

And that many more of the tourists, Britons, would have been killed had these workers not repeatedly put themselves at risk from the gunman to save them.

It is these people who are now suffering. The tourist industry is Tunisia’s biggest employer and foreign revenue earner, and its collapse has had a devastating effect. This is sowing dissatisfaction among those losing their jobs, who happen, mainly, to be young men. A rich seam is being created for Islamist extremists to exploit.

Seifeddine Rezgui, the young student who carried out the Sousse murders, lived with other members of his cell in the Islamic holy city of Kairouan. There, at the Great Mosque of Sidi Uqba, the Imam, Taib al-Gazi, spoke about clerics coming from Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states spreading intolerant Wahhabi doctrine.

The Imam and his colleagues had since then been vigilant in trying to keep extremist preachers away but, as he saw the local economy unravel, he told me: “We know there are people who want to spread poison in the name of religion. There are extremists here, in small numbers, but they are here. What could happen unless the jobs come back worries us greatly.”

Tunisia, the birthplace of the Arab Spring, is the only country in that tide of turbulence which did not suffer prolonged violent strife as that Spring turned into a bleak Winter. Now it is facing punitive economic sanctions because of a catastrophic fall in tourism. But the British government is unlikely to change its travel advice, especially with the threat of possible litigation if something went wrong in the future. The tour companies are also unlikely to start operating there largely for the same reason.