Just a thought, but it may he worth asking those that make the repair to take photos of what they find underneath.the patch - may make discussions easier with the original supplier if you bought it as a new boat....
The damage to the tube was very upsetting (and a little intriguing) but it's between me and the place I bought it from so I won't air dirty laundry in public. Hopefully they'll do the right thing and I have no reason to assume they won't. Fingers crossed.
Long story short we finally found somewhere about 30 minutes away from where we were staying to repair the boat. They had it for 4-5 days and we collected it and then had a great time boating!!!!
Thanks to everybody for all your help and suggestions. After finally finding somewhere to repair the damage, and after resolving our fuel to oil mix problem (another thread) we finally enjoyed a great 10 days boating.