Clubs are suddenly very much in fashion - news fashion, that is. The police and the tax agency have made them so. One of them is Amnesia, the Ibiza club that regularly features among awards for the best club in the world and which has been with us since the start of the 1970s. Amnesia, more than any other club, gave Ibiza its club reputation. It now looks as if it might acquire a different reputation.
Over recent days, the club and other property belonging to its owner, Martin Ferrer, have been raided by the Guardia Civil. The operation was ordered through a combination of an investigating judge in Ibiza, the tax agency and the Guardia Civil's central operations unit. The judge has since issued an order to "block" a total of sixteen properties belonging to Ferrer, meaning that they cannot be sold or their assets transferred. The scope of the operation is such that it involves property as far away as Leon on the mainland, where Ferrer has a house in Crémenes and various others.
The raid on Amnesia, which was over two days, extended to the opening of bank safe deposits. At least two million euros have been found. Ferrer was arrested but has been released, much to the perplexity of the prosecution service which had called for his precautionary detention and that of others. Nevertheless, the Guardia's criminal police and the tax agency believe they have the documentation they need and so it will not be altered or somehow disappear. Tax fraud and money laundering are the main charges that prosecutors are levelling.
The nature of the operation is such that Guardia detectives were moved in from Mallorca. Virtually no officers in Ibiza have been involved. At the room they have occupied at the Ibiza headquarters, the first thing that was done was to change the lock. A preliminary estimation by the tax agency of the level of alleged fraud is nearly five million euros. This figure relates to only two years - 2012 and 2013 - and this particular investigation was sparked by an anonymous tip-off directed principally against the former chief financial officer of Amnesia and related companies, Josep Aymar, with Ferrer also implicated.
The case has been several months in the unfolding. The prosecution service, on receipt of a report from the tax agency, lodged it was the court back in October. There had been a period of investigation prior to this, with the anonymous information and the facts it offered having been scrutinised.
The operation against Amnesia is not an isolated one. In fact it falls under a massive nationwide action. Dubbed "Operation Chopin", a total of 87 clubs were raided across Spain when officers from the Guardia, the National Police and the Mossos in Catalonia moved in early on Saturday morning at times when the clubs were closing: in the case of Amnesia, it typically closes at 7am. Among these clubs were other well-known ones in Ibiza - Space and Privilege - as well as BCM in Magalluf. Chopin is thus a major operation against potential tax fraud that embraces much of the elite of Balearic and Spanish nightlife.
The scale is enormous, the coordination of the action impressive. There were four clubs in the Balearics that were raided, but elsewhere there were as many as twenty (in Valencia), sixteen in both Catalonia and Galicia and ten in Andalusia. Together these clubs represent some twenty per cent of the entire turnover of Spain's nightlife sector. But what actually is the turnover? That's something for investigators to identify. Approximately 75% of revenue is cash.
As to Ferrer, it is not the first time that he has been the focus of an investigation. There was one in 2011 related to VAT returns five years previously. His involvement with Aymar is said to have been financially disadvantageous to him in that there were poor investment decisions, such as the Amnesia Barcelona project. An allegation is that the debt and interest that needed to be paid for that resulted in the diversion of funds in order to service the repayments; this represented, therefore, a loss for the tax agency, which is a polite way of saying that a fraud was committed.
Where does this all lead to? It's impossible to say. This is an investigation into a sector in which cash dominates. Establishing alleged trails of money laundering therefore becomes central. Unravelling them will not happen overnight; say between 12 midnight and 7am, when a club would be open.
Showing posts with label Clubs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Clubs. Show all posts
Sunday, July 10, 2016
Tuesday, June 21, 2016
The Island That Lost Control
I'm looking at a one-litre bottle of olive oil, the light variety, not the extra virgin type. I'm not sure if it would make a difference which sort it was for something I'm trying to figure out without going and trying it. How much oil do you suppose you need to make a hotel corridor (not carpeted) slippery enough in order to ensure that guests slip over? I'm guessing that a litre - of whatever type - wouldn't be adequate. You could do part of a corridor, but the whole corridor ...?
Now I'm looking at a chopping-board and at a ring on the cooker. How long would it take, I'm wondering, for the chopping-board to catch light on a full ring (electric)? Wooden, plastic: I reckon the plastic one would go up quicker. I'm not about to find out. To be honest, until only a short while before writing this, it had never occurred to me that one might put a chopping-board on a ring, go out and trust that it catches light - in a hotel apartment. Nor had it ever struck me that one might pour oil along a hotel corridor.
I've been looking, millions have been looking, at a video. Have you seen it? Fancy seeing someone being beaten and kicked senseless by security guards? A hotel's security guards? A hotel to the fore of a transformation. I don't need to tell you which one, do I. You already know. You'll have seen the video. As I say, millions have. The Mail has seen it too. As has The Star. The victim wasn't a guest as such. The hotel has explained this. What the hell difference does that make? You'll know the hotel. It invites the public in to enjoy its facilities. That makes the public guests. This is a hotel asked, by its relevant town hall, to assist in sending out positive messages for somewhere undergoing transformation. Here's the message: end up black and blue. What does the mayor say?
This is not the same hotel as the one with the items from the kitchen. Which one do you reckon that is? Do you suppose it's the same one that apparently only has one security guard at night for a complex of ... Of, ooh, quite a large size. It is.
Tourism is booming. But you know that. With or without booming tourism there is a need for control. Control of different types. Though when things are booming, you don't really want the absence of control or the wrong type of control to go and cock everything up. I know, I know, it's always been the case that where there has been tourism in Mallorca there has also been its less savoury side: its violence, its misbehaviour, its crime. It's just that I have an uneasy feeling. Far from there being greater and better control, there seems to be a deterioration. This uneasiness stems in part from a further sense of impotence - not mine but that of the rightful authorities, be they police or administrations.
Impunity. That's the word. The point is that efforts are made in one way, and the target of those efforts (the anti-social behaviour or whatever) move somewhere else. You can take the lads off the streets of Magalluf, but you can't take the lads out of Magalluf, except by party boat aka booze cruise. You'll have seen the videos of that as well, no doubt. And no one appears to know how or to be able to enforce control. Impunity. You take the lads off the streets of Magalluf, stick 'em in a hotel, and they (one at any rate) get their heads kicked in by security. Done with impunity, but captured on video. What in God's name were those security guards thinking? Do they think? Or are they incapable of thought? It would appear so.
You put lads and lasses in another hotel with all but non-existent security, and they run riot. Maximum control is to be exerted, says the town hall. Really? One security guard? There's your booming tourism for you. Kerching! Take the money, stick 'em in your crumbling hotel and don't bother to engage any security.
There's something else. It's quite extraordinary. The nightclubs association has been complaining about it. Private houses are being used as nightclubs. People are paying to get in and for drinks. All illegal, and to make matters worse for the association, whose members have to charge the top rate of IVA (VAT) for entrance and drinks, there is not one cent of tax paid. Well, of course there isn't. Impunity.
In this instance, there is also an absence of inspection, from whichever government department or other agency might be relevant: as with hotels, for which there is a total under-resourcing for inspection. So things just happen. Noses are thumbed. We don't care. There's your boom for you.
Friday, November 30, 2012
Join Our Club: BCM and theming
If you can't beat 'em, then join 'em. This is one way of interpreting the speculation surrounding Grupo Cursach possibly allowing the BCM brand to be adopted by a hotel (or hotels). It was generally thought that BCM was one of the principal objectors to the Fiesta Group's Mallorca Rocks hotel, one of the most obvious examples of hotel theming to date, and one very much with a more youthful market in mind. If so, then the BCM attitude has undergone some amelioration. The line now is that Mallorca Rocks (and Mallorca Wave) are complementary to BCM and that concerts finishing by midnight at Mallorca Rocks do not constitute a threat as such.
This was the line that should always have been adopted. The arrival of Mallorca Rocks - responded to last year by the staging of concerts by BCM in its square -marked a real opportunity for Magalluf. Rather than resisting, the impetus that Mallorca Rocks gave needed to be embraced. It now seems as though it has been. Momentum is gathering in establishing Magalluf even more firmly as a "party" resort, one in which the total should be greater than the sum of its individual parts. An incoming competitor, even a competitor whose competition is comparatively loose, which is the case where Mallorca Rocks is concerned, fertilises the ground from which more business can be grown - by all parties.
Cursach says that a hotel theming or branding exercise involving BCM is not a priority but that if the company were to go down that route then it would want to be involved in the management of a hotel; it wouldn't, therefore, just be a branding exercise. If Cursach does decide to diversify, it would be entirely its affair as to how this might work, but the fact that a declaration of intent has been made - in the form of a wish to manage a hotel, if only in partnership - suggests that the company may be closer to establishing such an arrangement than it is letting on. If it is, then good for it. The concept could well make a great deal of sense, not just for BCM but also for Magalluf.
There is a second reason for thinking that Cursach is "joining 'em" rather than trying to "beat 'em". This has to do with the reform of the tourism law which allows hotels to offer so-called secondary activities which would be open to non-guests. One such activity concerns the club sector, BCM's market therefore. While there have been understandable objections to the legal reform (and I have agreed that it can be construed as being unfair), a more positive way of looking at the reform is to try and get a piece of the action. And what better way than being a business from outside moving inside a hotel.
For a business with such a strong brand name and high awareness as BCM, an association with a hotel (or multiple associations) represents a means of exploiting and developing the brand. As such therefore, the reform of the law creates an opportunity. This, in the rush to condemn the reform, was probably being overlooked.
If opportunity there is then, would similar opportunities exist for other businesses and ones not just in Magalluf? They would apply pretty much exclusively to clubs, bars or even restaurants with strong names and reputations in specific resorts, but if I were to take a resort I know well - Alcúdia - I could think of a handful of businesses which might well indeed sense an opportunity; not for hotel theming or branding as such, but as an operator inside hotel grounds. Association with a strong name from outside the hotel could well be attractive to a hotel, as it would give the hotel additional marketing leverage.
But might such arrangements be harmful to the main business? Would it be a case of cannibalising the existing product or of stretching the brand to the extent that neither the original nor the new business benefits? Possibly it would, but not necessarily. Much would depend on the product of the new, hotel-based business, and this raises a question as to how adept some businesses might be in understanding new product development.
To come back to BCM and to Magalluf, if Cursach were to embark on a hotel theming venture, it would be another example of the extent to which the resort is being given a makeover. But there is in all of this makeover, a question mark, and it concerns just what sort of resort is being conceived. The ultimate party resort does not necessarily sit easily alongside ambitions for a more up-market family resort. And party resort brings with it certain downsides, as already exist in Magalluf.
Hotel theming, branding exercises need to be undertaken within the context of a wider and integrated strategy, the branding of Magalluf and how its component parts are organised and if necessary segregated. There is much to excite in Magalluf's rejuvenation, but there is much that also needs to be given careful thought.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Index for November 2012
BCM and hotel theming - 30 November 2012
British Consul non-replacement - 25 November 2012
Business opportunities: making them easier - 18 November 2012
Can Picafort front line - 9 November 2012
Car hire and tourist taxes - 7 November 2012
Carlos Delgado and the deer hunt - 21 November 2012
Catalonian election - 23 November 2012, 28 November 2012
Corruption and political party system - 1 November 2012
Dogs on beaches in Pollensa - 5 November 2012
Expatriate categorisation - 17 November 2012
Fishermen's guilds - 3 November 2012
Flags: bans on use - 27 November 2012
García surname popularity in Mallorca - 13 November 2012
Holiday lets and national law - 20 November 2012
Hotels and town hall bureaucracy - 2 November 2012
Joan Mesquida - 12 November 2012
Mass tourism - 10 November 2012
Mountains and snow - 29 November 2012
November - 6 November 2012
Palacio de Congresos - 26 November 2012
Pollensa fair - 14 November 2012
Press, Carlos Delgado and Artur Mas - 22 November 2012
Proposta per les Illes (El Pi) - 4 November 2012
Rafael Bosch and Cabrera diving trips - 11 November 2012
Ramon Llull Institute - 8 November 2012
Themed hotels - 16 November 2012
Tourism promotion obligations - 19 November 2012
Trust in politicians: lack of - 15 November 2012
This was the line that should always have been adopted. The arrival of Mallorca Rocks - responded to last year by the staging of concerts by BCM in its square -marked a real opportunity for Magalluf. Rather than resisting, the impetus that Mallorca Rocks gave needed to be embraced. It now seems as though it has been. Momentum is gathering in establishing Magalluf even more firmly as a "party" resort, one in which the total should be greater than the sum of its individual parts. An incoming competitor, even a competitor whose competition is comparatively loose, which is the case where Mallorca Rocks is concerned, fertilises the ground from which more business can be grown - by all parties.
Cursach says that a hotel theming or branding exercise involving BCM is not a priority but that if the company were to go down that route then it would want to be involved in the management of a hotel; it wouldn't, therefore, just be a branding exercise. If Cursach does decide to diversify, it would be entirely its affair as to how this might work, but the fact that a declaration of intent has been made - in the form of a wish to manage a hotel, if only in partnership - suggests that the company may be closer to establishing such an arrangement than it is letting on. If it is, then good for it. The concept could well make a great deal of sense, not just for BCM but also for Magalluf.
There is a second reason for thinking that Cursach is "joining 'em" rather than trying to "beat 'em". This has to do with the reform of the tourism law which allows hotels to offer so-called secondary activities which would be open to non-guests. One such activity concerns the club sector, BCM's market therefore. While there have been understandable objections to the legal reform (and I have agreed that it can be construed as being unfair), a more positive way of looking at the reform is to try and get a piece of the action. And what better way than being a business from outside moving inside a hotel.
For a business with such a strong brand name and high awareness as BCM, an association with a hotel (or multiple associations) represents a means of exploiting and developing the brand. As such therefore, the reform of the law creates an opportunity. This, in the rush to condemn the reform, was probably being overlooked.
If opportunity there is then, would similar opportunities exist for other businesses and ones not just in Magalluf? They would apply pretty much exclusively to clubs, bars or even restaurants with strong names and reputations in specific resorts, but if I were to take a resort I know well - Alcúdia - I could think of a handful of businesses which might well indeed sense an opportunity; not for hotel theming or branding as such, but as an operator inside hotel grounds. Association with a strong name from outside the hotel could well be attractive to a hotel, as it would give the hotel additional marketing leverage.
But might such arrangements be harmful to the main business? Would it be a case of cannibalising the existing product or of stretching the brand to the extent that neither the original nor the new business benefits? Possibly it would, but not necessarily. Much would depend on the product of the new, hotel-based business, and this raises a question as to how adept some businesses might be in understanding new product development.
To come back to BCM and to Magalluf, if Cursach were to embark on a hotel theming venture, it would be another example of the extent to which the resort is being given a makeover. But there is in all of this makeover, a question mark, and it concerns just what sort of resort is being conceived. The ultimate party resort does not necessarily sit easily alongside ambitions for a more up-market family resort. And party resort brings with it certain downsides, as already exist in Magalluf.
Hotel theming, branding exercises need to be undertaken within the context of a wider and integrated strategy, the branding of Magalluf and how its component parts are organised and if necessary segregated. There is much to excite in Magalluf's rejuvenation, but there is much that also needs to be given careful thought.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Index for November 2012
BCM and hotel theming - 30 November 2012
British Consul non-replacement - 25 November 2012
Business opportunities: making them easier - 18 November 2012
Can Picafort front line - 9 November 2012
Car hire and tourist taxes - 7 November 2012
Carlos Delgado and the deer hunt - 21 November 2012
Catalonian election - 23 November 2012, 28 November 2012
Corruption and political party system - 1 November 2012
Dogs on beaches in Pollensa - 5 November 2012
Expatriate categorisation - 17 November 2012
Fishermen's guilds - 3 November 2012
Flags: bans on use - 27 November 2012
García surname popularity in Mallorca - 13 November 2012
Holiday lets and national law - 20 November 2012
Hotels and town hall bureaucracy - 2 November 2012
Joan Mesquida - 12 November 2012
Mass tourism - 10 November 2012
Mountains and snow - 29 November 2012
November - 6 November 2012
Palacio de Congresos - 26 November 2012
Pollensa fair - 14 November 2012
Press, Carlos Delgado and Artur Mas - 22 November 2012
Proposta per les Illes (El Pi) - 4 November 2012
Rafael Bosch and Cabrera diving trips - 11 November 2012
Ramon Llull Institute - 8 November 2012
Themed hotels - 16 November 2012
Tourism promotion obligations - 19 November 2012
Trust in politicians: lack of - 15 November 2012
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Welcome To The Hotel Mallorca
Two months ago I wrote a piece entitled "Burying The Hatchet". I concluded by suggesting that the hatchet could, despite having been buried, just as easily be dug up again. And so it has been.
In truth, the hatchet wasn't ever buried, not where Carlos Delgado was concerned at any rate. The peace that had broken out between hoteliers in the Balearics and the complementary offer was intended to demonstrate that these two warring factions could create a unified front in the tourism sector. Perhaps the complementary offer - the bars, restaurants, clubs and what have you - were hoping that by appearing to be on the same side as the all-dominating hotel sector, the real enemy where it was concerned, tourism minister Delgado, might look more favourably upon it.
The hatchet had been brandished because of that part of the new tourism law which plans to grant hotels the opportunity of providing secondary activities in their grounds. By secondary activities, one means pretty much anything that is currently offered outside these grounds, which would, and this has really caused the complementary offer to engage in its war dance, be open to the general public. The secondary activities are the domain of the complementary offer; the way things are going, or the way the new tourism bill is going, there won't be an offer that complements hotels for much longer.
While the complementary offer is putting its warpaint on in seeking to encircle the wagons of the tourism ministry, its hoped-for cavalry in the form of the hotel sector has clearly forgotten that it came to some sort of agreement with the bars and restaurants back in February. I didn't think this new-found friendship would last and nor indeed has it.
When it became clear that Sheriff Delgado was intent on crashing through the saloon doors of the nearest bar or restaurant and firing from both hips an inducement to the hotels of making available 30% of their areas to new activities designed to fill further the hotels' safes, it was an offer the hotels couldn't refuse. What were they supposed to do? Say thanks very much, but we would rather our friends from the complementary sector didn't have to concern themselves with such new competition? If the bars, restaurants and so on had believed this, then they had been labouring under a serious misapprehension that suddenly the hotels were being co-operative and altruistic. These are, after all, the same hotels that have spent the past however many years being distinctly unco-operative by going all-inclusive.
The hotels have of course bitten Delgado's hand off. They are attempting to appear to still be on speaking terms with the complementary sector by pointing out that it is only 30% of their areas that might become buffets, discos, rock concerts, sports facilities, and God knows what else. They also say that there will still be restrictions in place that limit their activities by comparison with less regulation elsewhere, such as in competitor tourist destinations. The complementary sector will doubtless be reassured. Or not.
And of course it isn't, which is why it has gone over Delgado's head and demanded to see the Marshall, i.e. President Bauzá, and tell him that his underling is about to break with years of tradition and with a balance of hotel and complementary offer that has existed since mass tourism first settled in the old wild west, east, south and north of Mallorca.
The hotels are being disingenuous. 30% can equate to an awful lot of passing trade attracted by a buffet at an absurdly low price which a hotel might, as an example, wish to offer. And the price could well be low, that much lower than an outside restaurant could offer, because to provide this buffet would require only minimal additional cost. And 30%, depending on how large a hotel is, can mean an awful lot of space and therefore an awful lot of customers who aren't staying at the hotel.
To make things even more ducky where the complementary offer is concerned is the fact that hotels are going to be given the go-ahead for staging beach parties through new beach clubs. Another foul is being called, especially by the outside club sector, and that good old stand-by of the environment is being invoked as a way of trying to prevent these parties. There will be damage to dunes and so on, a concern that had probably never occurred to the clubs previously but which now suits them to express.
This is the new tourism law, therefore. Its passage is still not guaranteed, but it is doubtful to get much more by way of re-drafting. And when it is passed, Mallorca becomes one big hotel. Welcome to the Hotel Mallorca, such a lovely place ... .
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
In truth, the hatchet wasn't ever buried, not where Carlos Delgado was concerned at any rate. The peace that had broken out between hoteliers in the Balearics and the complementary offer was intended to demonstrate that these two warring factions could create a unified front in the tourism sector. Perhaps the complementary offer - the bars, restaurants, clubs and what have you - were hoping that by appearing to be on the same side as the all-dominating hotel sector, the real enemy where it was concerned, tourism minister Delgado, might look more favourably upon it.
The hatchet had been brandished because of that part of the new tourism law which plans to grant hotels the opportunity of providing secondary activities in their grounds. By secondary activities, one means pretty much anything that is currently offered outside these grounds, which would, and this has really caused the complementary offer to engage in its war dance, be open to the general public. The secondary activities are the domain of the complementary offer; the way things are going, or the way the new tourism bill is going, there won't be an offer that complements hotels for much longer.
While the complementary offer is putting its warpaint on in seeking to encircle the wagons of the tourism ministry, its hoped-for cavalry in the form of the hotel sector has clearly forgotten that it came to some sort of agreement with the bars and restaurants back in February. I didn't think this new-found friendship would last and nor indeed has it.
When it became clear that Sheriff Delgado was intent on crashing through the saloon doors of the nearest bar or restaurant and firing from both hips an inducement to the hotels of making available 30% of their areas to new activities designed to fill further the hotels' safes, it was an offer the hotels couldn't refuse. What were they supposed to do? Say thanks very much, but we would rather our friends from the complementary sector didn't have to concern themselves with such new competition? If the bars, restaurants and so on had believed this, then they had been labouring under a serious misapprehension that suddenly the hotels were being co-operative and altruistic. These are, after all, the same hotels that have spent the past however many years being distinctly unco-operative by going all-inclusive.
The hotels have of course bitten Delgado's hand off. They are attempting to appear to still be on speaking terms with the complementary sector by pointing out that it is only 30% of their areas that might become buffets, discos, rock concerts, sports facilities, and God knows what else. They also say that there will still be restrictions in place that limit their activities by comparison with less regulation elsewhere, such as in competitor tourist destinations. The complementary sector will doubtless be reassured. Or not.
And of course it isn't, which is why it has gone over Delgado's head and demanded to see the Marshall, i.e. President Bauzá, and tell him that his underling is about to break with years of tradition and with a balance of hotel and complementary offer that has existed since mass tourism first settled in the old wild west, east, south and north of Mallorca.
The hotels are being disingenuous. 30% can equate to an awful lot of passing trade attracted by a buffet at an absurdly low price which a hotel might, as an example, wish to offer. And the price could well be low, that much lower than an outside restaurant could offer, because to provide this buffet would require only minimal additional cost. And 30%, depending on how large a hotel is, can mean an awful lot of space and therefore an awful lot of customers who aren't staying at the hotel.
To make things even more ducky where the complementary offer is concerned is the fact that hotels are going to be given the go-ahead for staging beach parties through new beach clubs. Another foul is being called, especially by the outside club sector, and that good old stand-by of the environment is being invoked as a way of trying to prevent these parties. There will be damage to dunes and so on, a concern that had probably never occurred to the clubs previously but which now suits them to express.
This is the new tourism law, therefore. Its passage is still not guaranteed, but it is doubtful to get much more by way of re-drafting. And when it is passed, Mallorca becomes one big hotel. Welcome to the Hotel Mallorca, such a lovely place ... .
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Bouncy, Bouncy: Regulation of bouncers
The bouncers of the Balearics are going to have to go back to school. The regional government is proposing a law that will require bouncers to undergo an official course and to pass a test that will gauge both physical and psychological abilities to do the job.
The requirements for being accredited are wide-ranging, from understanding rights under the Constitution to being able to resolve conflicts without resorting to violent methods and to having basic abilities in both Catalan and Spanish.
The background to all this is three-fold: the death of a club goer in Madrid at the hands of bouncers; the legal vacuum surrounding the club security business; the bad image that bouncers have. The colloquial term for a bouncer is "gorila"; the nicer one is "portero", the same word for goalkeeper.
Bouncers have tried to improve their image. In the UK they have been re-invented as "door hosts" or "door supervisors", but the image endures, one of intimidating muscle-bound gym monkeys - gorillas. The law in the Balearics will not be too dissimilar to requirements in the UK for obtaining a "door supervisor licence", which demands 30 hours of training; in fact, it seems to be more stringent.
At the same time as the Balearics are going down the same sort of track as the UK, there are concerns that the UK is about to take a backwards step. The Security Industry Authority, which licenses bouncers, is also a Quango and may well be disbanded. The fear is that this will mean a return to the bad old days and the re-emergence of organised crime running the club security business.
A question arises as to why there hasn't been effective control of bouncers. A central law transferred responsibility for its being enacted in the Balearics several years ago. But it was never acted upon. A conference on civil responsibility, held in Ibiza in June this year, looked specifically at the failure to introduce regulation and recorded various reports of attacks by bouncers, including one that was racially aggravated (the Balearics law includes specific mention of racism).
One aspect of the new law, and which may explain why it has not been introduced before, is that it is likely to end up costing not only individual bouncers but also club owners. Licence charges aren't that high in the UK, but this doesn't mean that they might not be in the Balearics. But even a low charge adds some further financial burden as well as further regulation to an industry that awaits the introduction of the smoking ban with some trepidation; of all the "hostelry" sectors, clubs and night bars are expected to be the hardest hit by the ban. So we can probably expect some condemnation of the law.
What doesn't seem to be being mentioned, though, is anything about tourists. As is often the case, it can be salutary to see what is being said on internet forums. In the case of bouncers, they are "aggressive", turn people away without explanation and, in one instance, did nothing to intervene when someone was being beaten up "for 15 minutes" in a particular club. Then there is the question of age. Unless you look really young, you shouldn't have problems getting past the bouncers was one piece of advice. A further aspect of the new law will be to deal with underage drinking, something which has been poorly tackled across the board in Mallorca and Spain, and so check ID. A problem, especially for British kids, is whether they have any.
As ever though, there will be an issue as to how rigorously new regulations will be applied and who will be doing the applying, and in the case of those currently working in the "industry", they will have until 2014 to pass their tests. To which one might ask: why so long? Bouncers will be going back to school, but the lessons won't be starting for some time yet.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The requirements for being accredited are wide-ranging, from understanding rights under the Constitution to being able to resolve conflicts without resorting to violent methods and to having basic abilities in both Catalan and Spanish.
The background to all this is three-fold: the death of a club goer in Madrid at the hands of bouncers; the legal vacuum surrounding the club security business; the bad image that bouncers have. The colloquial term for a bouncer is "gorila"; the nicer one is "portero", the same word for goalkeeper.
Bouncers have tried to improve their image. In the UK they have been re-invented as "door hosts" or "door supervisors", but the image endures, one of intimidating muscle-bound gym monkeys - gorillas. The law in the Balearics will not be too dissimilar to requirements in the UK for obtaining a "door supervisor licence", which demands 30 hours of training; in fact, it seems to be more stringent.
At the same time as the Balearics are going down the same sort of track as the UK, there are concerns that the UK is about to take a backwards step. The Security Industry Authority, which licenses bouncers, is also a Quango and may well be disbanded. The fear is that this will mean a return to the bad old days and the re-emergence of organised crime running the club security business.
A question arises as to why there hasn't been effective control of bouncers. A central law transferred responsibility for its being enacted in the Balearics several years ago. But it was never acted upon. A conference on civil responsibility, held in Ibiza in June this year, looked specifically at the failure to introduce regulation and recorded various reports of attacks by bouncers, including one that was racially aggravated (the Balearics law includes specific mention of racism).
One aspect of the new law, and which may explain why it has not been introduced before, is that it is likely to end up costing not only individual bouncers but also club owners. Licence charges aren't that high in the UK, but this doesn't mean that they might not be in the Balearics. But even a low charge adds some further financial burden as well as further regulation to an industry that awaits the introduction of the smoking ban with some trepidation; of all the "hostelry" sectors, clubs and night bars are expected to be the hardest hit by the ban. So we can probably expect some condemnation of the law.
What doesn't seem to be being mentioned, though, is anything about tourists. As is often the case, it can be salutary to see what is being said on internet forums. In the case of bouncers, they are "aggressive", turn people away without explanation and, in one instance, did nothing to intervene when someone was being beaten up "for 15 minutes" in a particular club. Then there is the question of age. Unless you look really young, you shouldn't have problems getting past the bouncers was one piece of advice. A further aspect of the new law will be to deal with underage drinking, something which has been poorly tackled across the board in Mallorca and Spain, and so check ID. A problem, especially for British kids, is whether they have any.
As ever though, there will be an issue as to how rigorously new regulations will be applied and who will be doing the applying, and in the case of those currently working in the "industry", they will have until 2014 to pass their tests. To which one might ask: why so long? Bouncers will be going back to school, but the lessons won't be starting for some time yet.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Monday, March 17, 2008
Wired For Sound
I walk the streets. This street, next street. I walk the streets, and often I don't get to the end of the street. It happens all the time. Bump into somebody or they bump into me, or call out from a bar as I pass. Today it happened, several times, like many days. I was going along the road by the car parking in Puerto Alcúdia, taking care of falling masonry and heavy equipment barging its way across the pavement. There was this lady. No, I didn't recognise her. It was the rather racy outfit and the sunglasses, and then she told me. Of course, she used to work at La Villa.
La Villa is one of Alcúdia's numerous Chinese restaurants, but it is arguably the best. Put it this way, it features in a recent a la carte type publication. Not something that your bog-standard Chinky would normally aspire to. I have been going there for years, taking photos there for years. And that was the thing. She had worked there for 15 years and was wondering if I had a record of her time there. It is really quite odd what you get stopped in the street and asked.
Then there was earlier in the day, passing Sandra´s Bar, and out runs Bill and is keen to show me something. Head phones. Head phones, as in headphones in clubs and discos and anywhere else that they might be useful. First I'd heard of the idea. The deal is that clubbers (or others) get a set of wireless headphones and they can hear the music through them. Sounds a bit odd to me, but there is a big plus point in that clubs and bars that give out too much noise and too many reverberations can now get round this by having, supposedly, total silence save for the muffled sound of headsets. Except it wouldn't be silent. Firstly, there would be people screaming their heads off trying to talk to each other and secondly I can't quite imagine a club without music booming out - without the aid of headphones. But apparently it is already a bit of a thing, and so Bill's looking to get it off the ground in Mallorca. Fair enough. Here's the link that tells you how it all works - www.hedfoneparty.com - and here's Bill's number, 637 987 576.
The idea may have legs. Bars have become hamstrung by rules on noise, especially that which means they have to use limiters on music volume. So these headphones could be a good idea, even if it does seem a tad bizarre.
QUIZ
Yesterday - Pet Shop Boys and Dusty Springfield. Today's title - wouldn't find him down a club nowadays, one imagines.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
La Villa is one of Alcúdia's numerous Chinese restaurants, but it is arguably the best. Put it this way, it features in a recent a la carte type publication. Not something that your bog-standard Chinky would normally aspire to. I have been going there for years, taking photos there for years. And that was the thing. She had worked there for 15 years and was wondering if I had a record of her time there. It is really quite odd what you get stopped in the street and asked.
Then there was earlier in the day, passing Sandra´s Bar, and out runs Bill and is keen to show me something. Head phones. Head phones, as in headphones in clubs and discos and anywhere else that they might be useful. First I'd heard of the idea. The deal is that clubbers (or others) get a set of wireless headphones and they can hear the music through them. Sounds a bit odd to me, but there is a big plus point in that clubs and bars that give out too much noise and too many reverberations can now get round this by having, supposedly, total silence save for the muffled sound of headsets. Except it wouldn't be silent. Firstly, there would be people screaming their heads off trying to talk to each other and secondly I can't quite imagine a club without music booming out - without the aid of headphones. But apparently it is already a bit of a thing, and so Bill's looking to get it off the ground in Mallorca. Fair enough. Here's the link that tells you how it all works - www.hedfoneparty.com - and here's Bill's number, 637 987 576.
The idea may have legs. Bars have become hamstrung by rules on noise, especially that which means they have to use limiters on music volume. So these headphones could be a good idea, even if it does seem a tad bizarre.
QUIZ
Yesterday - Pet Shop Boys and Dusty Springfield. Today's title - wouldn't find him down a club nowadays, one imagines.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
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