There's No Such Thing As Unfair Competition

Time was when only scant attention, if any attention at all, was paid to health and safety in Mallorca. There are still examples of this attention being scantily clad but an unsafe and an unhealthy cultural tradition has been replaced by one that bears more resemblance to Anglo-Saxon fastidiousness than the previous Latin-Mediterranean couldn't-care-less-ness. And when it suits certain interested parties to come over all safety-concious-righteous, they will play the H&S card for all it's worth.

Safety, or the perceived absence of safety, is invoked as a means of attacking unfair competition. Go back a couple of years, and you might recall all the fuss about the Mallorca Rocks hotel in Magalluf. Objectors to this dealt the safety card (all those thousands of people packed into a hotel inner square with a swimming-pool slap bang in the middle). But the safety thing was really only a healthily-safely correct smokescreen to disguise the main source of objection - the alleged unfair competition that was being provided by an upstart operator who had allied with a hotel chain to provide music concerts and so threaten the years of dominance of certain clubs in Magalluf. One in particular.

Safety isn't really the issue. It wasn't in Magalluf and it isn't in Alcúdia, where the taxi-drivers, to no one's surprise, have launched their objections against the tourist mini-train. When it was announced some while back that the tourist train was making a comeback, I wondered how it could make a comeback. It was primarily the taxi-drivers that ganged up in order to ensure the demise of the old train. Yes, there was a fair old dose of politics as well, but while these might have changed in the thirteen years since the tourist train hit the buffers, taxi-driver business hasn't. Bringing the train back was always going to prompt objections from the interested party that is the taxi-driver collective of Alcúdia, and it has taken only a few days of the train being operable for the objections to surface.

The taxi-drivers see the train as a competitor. This is the issue. There isn't another one. They append the "unfair" adjective to competitor, because unfair competition is a regular way for interested parties to seek sympathy for their cause. The competition was unfair at Mallorca Rocks (for reasons that were never that clear, given that concerts finished by midnight and that clubs don't get going until midnight), the competition to bars and restaurants from all-inclusive hotels is unfair (when in fact it isn't, as it is competition driven by a free market), the competition to hotels from so-called illegal accommodation is unfair because this accommodation does not adhere to the same standards of safety, quality and tax disclosure (a spurious argument, as it would adhere to these standards if such accommodation could be fully regulated rather than exist in a legal vacuum).

The unfair competition gambit goes only so far, however, in creating sympathy for the cause. It is not as emotional an argument as the safety one; hence, the reason for safety being invoked. In the case of the train, think of all those little tourist kiddies who might be thrown to their deaths from a vehicle with no doors. Or something like this. Yes, there is, in theory, a safety risk. But have there ever been any incidents? There are tourist trains in Playa de Muro, Can Picafort, Cala Bona and elsewhere, but I have never heard of there being any accidents, or any that have been at all serious.

The taxi-drivers simply can't accept any competition. As established operators, they will object to anything that might be. It was similar when the Alcúdia sightseeing bus started. There were objections to this from the taxis and also from the local public-bus operator. In fact, the sightseeing bus was denounced. On what grounds? It was an excursion bus. People couldn't just hop on and off and use it as a means of getting from A to B.

The tourist train is as much an excursion as it is a way of getting from one place to another. It is a pretty inefficient way of, say, travelling from Bellevue to the port. It goes slowly, it stops en route, it doesn't go right into the port. It is also, for a family of four as an example, more expensive than a taxi. If two kids qualify for the kids' rate, the family of four will pay eight euros, forty. A taxi wouldn't cost as much.

The taxi-drivers reckon that the train has already meant that their local business is down by 40%. Perhaps it is, there is no way of being able to dispute or verify this, but it would be a surprise if it were, but not a surprise because such statistics are tossed around as further evidence for building up the case for sympathy. But sympathy is in limited supply. There is none from the town hall and there will be none from tourists. The tourist train is back, and competition or not, unfair or not, tourists like little tourist trains.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

The Return Of Ivor The Alcúdia Engine

A long time ago in the top right-hand corner of Mallorca there lived a small green train called Ivor. His very best friend was known as Jones the Steam, though his name was really Miguel. Ivor had once been in service with The Merioneth and Llantisilly Railway Traction Company Limited. Like others from strange lands across seas, Ivor had made his way to Mallorca and it was here that he met Jones the Steam, as Miguel was to become known.

Every early morning in summer, Ivor would leave his shed and roll into the bright sunshine. He would blow his whistles, and so famous did the sound of Ivor's whistles become that they were added to - with organ pipes donated by Morgan the Magic Roundabout fairground owner. 

Though he was from a strange land across seas where they did things differently and usually with greater efficiency, Ivor had never been an engine cut out for the precision of train operations. In the top right-hand corner of Mallorca, he found what he had been looking for since his earliest days as a novice train: a place where timetables existed only in theory and where rules were drawn up in order that they could be ignored. Ivor would often simply take himself off and head to the seaside, and there was a great deal of seaside in this top right-hand corner of Mallorca. Here, Ivor would spend days with his friends and sing with the local choir.

Disobedient though Ivor was, exasperated though Jones the Steam could become, infuriated though Dai Mayor (whose name wasn't actually Dai) would be because of Ivor's wilful neglect of his duties, everyone loved Ivor. Especially the children. They would clamber aboard his rolling-stock and scream and wail: "choo-choo", "chuffer-chuffer", "woo-woo". Ivor would respond by playing tunes on his whistles and organ pipes and by making them all cups of tea.

But as things turned out, not everyone did love Ivor. Idris the Taxi didn't. "He's taking my business from me," he would moan. So one day, Idris went to see Dai Mayor and gave him an ultimatum. "Either it's Idris or it's Ivor." And Dai Mayor, to everyone's great sorrow, agreed with Idris the Taxi.

For days after, people were to be seen weeping openly in the streets. They would look longingly for the sight of Ivor rumbling past the Magic Roundabout. Morgan would wait for the organ pipes to be blown, small children would anticipate the tooting of the whistles. But there was no sight and no sound of Ivor. He was no more.

A broken engine, Ivor returned to the strange land across the seas. But though the years passed and summers came and went, the people of the top right-hand corner of Mallorca remembered Ivor. They remembered him with affection and love. They wanted him back and hoped for a day when he might return.

Then, not so long ago, Jones the Steam, who had left Mallorca with Ivor, received a letter. "It's from that place you come from, Jones," announced Pat the Post. "I've not heard from anyone there for years," replied Jones. He opened the letter and his eyes lit up. "Ivor, Ivor," he shouted. "They want us back. They want us back." Ivor, who had not blown a whistle or organ pipe for well over ten years, suddenly burst into tune. Jones cranked him up and soon the unmistakable sound of Ivor was making its way back across seas to the top right-hand corner of Mallorca. "Puffer-puffer, puffer-puffer, woo-woo."

And now, Ivor has returned to his beloved Alcúdia. They lined the streets and waved as he reappeared triumphantly. Idris the Taxi had retired, Dai Mayor had seen the error of his ways, and so all the small children were happy again, as was Morgan the Magic Roundabout. The whistles and the organ pipes can once more be heard and now there are new as well as old friends for Ivor to shout his hellos to as he wheels around Alcúdia. There's Jan the Jolly, Nobby the Noble, James the Fox, Ian the Carvery, Alwyn the Roast, Gavin the Port.

"Look you, Ivor," they all cry back, except the Welsh, who know better. And in the bright sunshine, Ivor rolls along the streets of Alcúdia, past the lake and around the roundabout, a happy smile on Jones the Steam's face. Ivor is back. A small green train in the right-hand corner of Mallorca. "Choo-choo, chuffer-chuffer, woo-woo."





 
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.