Which collective in Mallorca is the greatest villain of all? Politicians? No, they're too much of an obvious and easy target. The wretches of Magalluf, Santa Ponsa and Playa de Palma who masquerade as prostitutes and can resort to pepper spraying victims in their pursuit of loot to pacify their mafia bosses? Quite probably they are the greatest.
They, the prostitutes, are villains of criminality. With certain other collectives there may be some issues of legality, but that's not the same thing. Legality or illegality is often a question of legal interpretation. Beating someone up, robbing him and being run by organised gangs carries no equivocation of interpretation. Or shouldn't, as oddly enough it can seem as though it does.
Let's consider three other groups. Hoteliers. Here is a collective which is castigated for its greed. They put up prices, invest the profits in luxurious all-inclusives in distant lands, pay employees meagre wages and butt heads with the heroic angels of the holiday rental sector. Villains. Well, possibly, but such generalising does rather fail to take into account the fact that the hoteliers have been the cause and conduit for much of Mallorca's wealth.
Then we have cyclists. These occupiers of drivers' territory, they are terrorisers of the road. They are without courtesy, without manners and, worst of all, they wear lycra. Their villainry is such that it is greater in the eyes of some than that of the hoteliers. This is villainry that brings with it venom and even hatred. Will they introduce cyclist hate crimes into the penal code at some point? Perhaps the legislators should, but there again they are politicians, and what do they know. But cyclists bring with them off-season employment and business. The villainry argument cannot accept that there are indeed cyclists who spread wealth rather than keep it hidden inside the lycra.
The third collective is taxi drivers. Oh dear, oh dear. This reviled group is the manifestation of rip-off, it exploits and seeks to maintain some form of cartel, it defies all attempts at transport reform, it is the antithesis of the "collaborative economy". Fine, but it costs to operate a taxi, there are regulations to abide by, and, strangely enough, some punters quite like taking a taxi.
While there can be justification for characterising these three groups as villains, there is also a good deal of irrationality. Villainry brooks no perspective. The cliché narratives are thus littered with greed, lycra and rip-off.
Justification comes when the villains act in a way that makes them their own worst enemies. The taxi drivers did just that last week. Stopping work at the airport for over three hours was no way to win over hearts and minds that had hardened because of their opposition to new bus services. The president of the travel agencies association was right to describe the action as pathetic. The fact that it took place on the evening before the government was due to approve its decree on touting for business on the public highway (a decree to clarify the situation to the taxi drivers' advantage) made it even less acceptable.
So, the taxi drivers, especially as the cyclists have mostly all gone, can now claim the number one villainry spot. Is there no sympathy for them? Personally, I have some, as I do for the hoteliers and cyclists. Ten thousand drivers from across the land marched on Madrid on Tuesday. Their protest was directed at so-called VTCs, vehicles with drivers, a specific form of transport into which Uber and Cabify are falling. In other words, they are not taxis; they are a category apart.
Neither Uber nor Cabify operates in Mallorca. Yet. In fact neither is particularly widespread on the mainland. Uber was ordered by the courts to stop operations at the end of 2014. It has since re-emerged as UberX under the VTC umbrella but is still very confined. The taxi drivers, though, fear the spread of both services, which is why they were protesting.
The problem for the taxi drivers is that their villainry is such that their critics cry competition and a dismantling of a form of monopoly. Uber is the über-example of competition on the roads in much the same way as Airbnb is in apartment buildings. While Airbnb is viewed as a villain in some quarters, it is hailed as a hero in others. Uber, at present, appears only to be a villain in the eyes of taxi drivers. Otherwise it is the people's hero, effecting the free marketing of transport.
However, these rival services exploit a situation not of the taxi-drivers' making. It is one of legislators and regulators who have so over-regulated the taxi sector that it can't adequately react even if it wanted to. Consider them villains if you must, but maybe it is the politicians who are indeed the greatest villains.
Showing posts with label Hoteliers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hoteliers. Show all posts
Thursday, June 01, 2017
Thursday, December 01, 2016
Keep Taking Us To Havana
It may be that someone did actually say "take me to Havana" in the days when airplane hijacks suddenly became popular and the Cuban capital was on the list of favoured destinations for the asylum-seeker. Closed off, to US airlines at any rate, the island nation had acquired a certain mystic, courtesy of Fidel Castro.
In the 1960s, when various individuals supposedly started to wander into cockpits in order to request a detour, Spain remained committed to the 1953 agreement with the US (and Vatican) by which the Franco regime was to legitimise itself in the view of a doubting international community. A pro-American policy wasn't, however, to prevent the regime from establishing a relationship with Castro, and this owed much to the coincidence of 1959: Castro staged his revolution, while Spain adopted the Stabilisation Plan which was to underpin the country's economic revolution.
Prior to the rise of Castro, Franco had been seeking to exert Spanish influence throughout the one-time empire of Central and South America. This was via a combination of the concept of "Hispanidad" and the stifling Catholicism that had characterised the Franco regime from the time of the Civil War. The clash of ideologies that Castro's revolution represented might well have shattered relations with Spain, with the threat to these relations initially equal on both sides. Cuba expelled the Spanish ambassador in 1960 for having interrupted Castro while he was criticising Spain. The regime, for its part, was under pressure from external forces (especially the Americans) and because of dissenting voices internally.
But through the 1960s a realpolitik emerged that was based far less (if at all) on the previous nationalist-religious philosophy and very much more on economic necessity. The dogmas of the Falange were discarded in favour of the technocracy of Opus Dei. The pragmatic technocrats, so important in having guided Spain to a more stable economic future courtesy of, for example tourism, viewed Cuba purely in economic terms. Trade with Cuba, rather than lessening, increased during the 1960s, and by the 1970s there was pretty much full-scale economic cooperation.
For the regime, Cuba held special significance. This had been one of Spain's most important colonies in the nineteenth century. The economic relationship was such that Mallorcans were among those who grew rich through trading with the island (and also Puerto Rico). When Cuba was lost during the humiliations suffered at the hands of the Americans at the end of the nineteenth century, national (and military) pride was shattered. Franco had sought to restore this. Despite what the Americans felt about Castro, events of 1898 still influenced thinking.
The ties with Cuba, strengthened by the PSOE government of Felipe González, were such that in 1990 the old relationship with Mallorca's entrepreneurs was truly revived. In that year, the Sol Palmeras hotel was opened. The following year, Castro attended the opening of the Meliá Varadero hotel, just as he had been at the inauguration of the Sol Palmeras.
The way had been opened up by a businessman from the Canaries, Enrique Martinón, who was the first to really sense the tourist possibilities in Cuba. Sol Meliá, as was, entered into a 50-50 joint venture with the Cuban state corporation. Mallorca's hoteliers were thus beginning a lucrative association with Cuba, the main problem to which was to be the 1996 Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity (Libertad) Act, otherwise known as the Helms-Burton Act, under which foreign companies could be sued for "trafficking" land confiscated from Americans after the Castro revolution. At least one hotel, Las Americas, was on land that had belonged to the Dupont family.
The Helms-Burton Act was met with a unified response of opposition by the European Union, but in the same year that it was passed, José María Aznar of the Partido Popular came to power. He adopted a much tougher attitude towards Cuba, and the EU accepted a "common position" - proposed by Madrid - to pursue democratic reforms in Cuba. This political move pleased the American government, but it was also a means - so it seemed - for a deal to be struck: Spanish companies would not be pursued by Helms-Burton. Aznar, for all his hardline stance, was to go to Cuba in 1999. He stayed at the Havana Meliá, showing his support for Spanish entrepreneurs and protesting against Helms-Burton and the US embargo.
If nothing else, this all highlighted what by then were one hundred years of US-Spanish tensions where Cuba was concerned. Meliá was obliged to disinvest in the US, having set its stall out in Cuba, a loyalty that Castro recognised, but any difficulties were not to get in the way of Mallorcan hotelier expansion. Iberostar appeared in 1998, and with Meliá now forms by far the strongest presence. There are currently some 58,000 hotel places in Cuba. Roughly half of them are under the control of Balearic hotel chains.
In the 1960s, when various individuals supposedly started to wander into cockpits in order to request a detour, Spain remained committed to the 1953 agreement with the US (and Vatican) by which the Franco regime was to legitimise itself in the view of a doubting international community. A pro-American policy wasn't, however, to prevent the regime from establishing a relationship with Castro, and this owed much to the coincidence of 1959: Castro staged his revolution, while Spain adopted the Stabilisation Plan which was to underpin the country's economic revolution.
Prior to the rise of Castro, Franco had been seeking to exert Spanish influence throughout the one-time empire of Central and South America. This was via a combination of the concept of "Hispanidad" and the stifling Catholicism that had characterised the Franco regime from the time of the Civil War. The clash of ideologies that Castro's revolution represented might well have shattered relations with Spain, with the threat to these relations initially equal on both sides. Cuba expelled the Spanish ambassador in 1960 for having interrupted Castro while he was criticising Spain. The regime, for its part, was under pressure from external forces (especially the Americans) and because of dissenting voices internally.
But through the 1960s a realpolitik emerged that was based far less (if at all) on the previous nationalist-religious philosophy and very much more on economic necessity. The dogmas of the Falange were discarded in favour of the technocracy of Opus Dei. The pragmatic technocrats, so important in having guided Spain to a more stable economic future courtesy of, for example tourism, viewed Cuba purely in economic terms. Trade with Cuba, rather than lessening, increased during the 1960s, and by the 1970s there was pretty much full-scale economic cooperation.
For the regime, Cuba held special significance. This had been one of Spain's most important colonies in the nineteenth century. The economic relationship was such that Mallorcans were among those who grew rich through trading with the island (and also Puerto Rico). When Cuba was lost during the humiliations suffered at the hands of the Americans at the end of the nineteenth century, national (and military) pride was shattered. Franco had sought to restore this. Despite what the Americans felt about Castro, events of 1898 still influenced thinking.
The ties with Cuba, strengthened by the PSOE government of Felipe González, were such that in 1990 the old relationship with Mallorca's entrepreneurs was truly revived. In that year, the Sol Palmeras hotel was opened. The following year, Castro attended the opening of the Meliá Varadero hotel, just as he had been at the inauguration of the Sol Palmeras.
The way had been opened up by a businessman from the Canaries, Enrique Martinón, who was the first to really sense the tourist possibilities in Cuba. Sol Meliá, as was, entered into a 50-50 joint venture with the Cuban state corporation. Mallorca's hoteliers were thus beginning a lucrative association with Cuba, the main problem to which was to be the 1996 Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity (Libertad) Act, otherwise known as the Helms-Burton Act, under which foreign companies could be sued for "trafficking" land confiscated from Americans after the Castro revolution. At least one hotel, Las Americas, was on land that had belonged to the Dupont family.
The Helms-Burton Act was met with a unified response of opposition by the European Union, but in the same year that it was passed, José María Aznar of the Partido Popular came to power. He adopted a much tougher attitude towards Cuba, and the EU accepted a "common position" - proposed by Madrid - to pursue democratic reforms in Cuba. This political move pleased the American government, but it was also a means - so it seemed - for a deal to be struck: Spanish companies would not be pursued by Helms-Burton. Aznar, for all his hardline stance, was to go to Cuba in 1999. He stayed at the Havana Meliá, showing his support for Spanish entrepreneurs and protesting against Helms-Burton and the US embargo.
If nothing else, this all highlighted what by then were one hundred years of US-Spanish tensions where Cuba was concerned. Meliá was obliged to disinvest in the US, having set its stall out in Cuba, a loyalty that Castro recognised, but any difficulties were not to get in the way of Mallorcan hotelier expansion. Iberostar appeared in 1998, and with Meliá now forms by far the strongest presence. There are currently some 58,000 hotel places in Cuba. Roughly half of them are under the control of Balearic hotel chains.
Saturday, October 01, 2016
Hotelier And Airbnb Wars
The Balearic High Court has not dismissed the Majorca Hoteliers Federation's appeal for judicial review of the tourist tax legislation. A reason for having believed it would was that the same court had dismissed a similar appeal against the old ecotax. There was precedence, therefore. It would be interesting to know what the court has discovered this time to rule the appeal admissible. We may in due course find out.
How much of a spanner this puts in the works will not be immediately apparent. There may be none. The hoteliers, as the appellant, will be asked by the court to formally instruct an appeal once all the documentation related to the processing of the legislation has been delivered. One imagines that the federation will do this. Meanwhile, legal services, one guesses, will be chewing over what there might be in the text of the law (and its processing) to have persuaded the court to rule admissibility. Podemos, typically strident in voicing contempt of the hoteliers' appeal, have suggested they would assist the government in any "emergency" decree to shore up any weaknesses.
This is where one enters the complexities of the legislative system. Unrelated to tourism, a similar system arose with the previous government's trilingual teaching scheme. The courts ruled that procedure for its implementation had not been complied with correctly. The then government of the Partido Popular, arguing this was an administrative technicality, rushed in a decree to ensure that the scheme could proceed. It was this as much as anything which led to the lengthy teachers' strike: the government was perceived to have been acting in a high-handed manner in going against the courts.
Were something similar to arise now, there is no one to go on strike, but - and for the moment it is speculation - a federation riposte may be to call for "precautionary measures". Inma Benito, the president, has implied that the federation would not seek these. Not at the moment anyway. If the judge were to rule in favour of any such demand, the tax could be suspended, pending the full judicial review. The consequences would be chaotic.
An emergency decree might be sufficient to stop the appeal in its tracks, but even if it were to be, one wouldn't then rule out the federation making a further challenge. The whole affair seems destined for all-out war.
There's ever more on the related issue of saturation and holiday rentals. Quite by coincidence, the day after writing the article "Is Airbnb The Real Scourge" came a report of actions by anti-Airbnb protesters in Barcelona. They occupied a building where they say the apartments are all illegal tourist lets and pointed out that an owner of one has twelve in all in the city.
The political atmosphere in Barcelona regarding lets is more heated than in Mallorca, and so it is more likely to give rise to such protests (there was also one against "Harmony Of The Seas"). But Barcelona is acting as a lead for others - here and in other European cities - and one can begin to understand that the protesters may have a legitimate point. They argue that far from Airbnb (taken as shorthand to refer to other such sites as well) promoting the so-called collaborative economy, it is fostering a speculative economy that is based on tourist accommodation, a great deal of it illegal. They have some curious allies in this thinking, such as Exceltur, the alliance for touristic excellence, of which leading Mallorcan hoteliers are members.
The Barcelona protesters insist that Airbnb knows full well what is licensed and what isn't, but chooses to ignore the distinction to its own benefit and to the benefits of multiple property owners. The company says that 73% of those who advertise their properties only have the one (which does leave 27% who have more) and that the city's economy benefits to the tune of 740 million euros per annum because of its activities.
The reverse of this percentage, at least where Mallorca is concerned and according to Exceltur, is that 70% of owners have more than one property that is being promoted via Airbnb or other sites.
Who's right and who's wrong in all this? It's another war.
How much of a spanner this puts in the works will not be immediately apparent. There may be none. The hoteliers, as the appellant, will be asked by the court to formally instruct an appeal once all the documentation related to the processing of the legislation has been delivered. One imagines that the federation will do this. Meanwhile, legal services, one guesses, will be chewing over what there might be in the text of the law (and its processing) to have persuaded the court to rule admissibility. Podemos, typically strident in voicing contempt of the hoteliers' appeal, have suggested they would assist the government in any "emergency" decree to shore up any weaknesses.
This is where one enters the complexities of the legislative system. Unrelated to tourism, a similar system arose with the previous government's trilingual teaching scheme. The courts ruled that procedure for its implementation had not been complied with correctly. The then government of the Partido Popular, arguing this was an administrative technicality, rushed in a decree to ensure that the scheme could proceed. It was this as much as anything which led to the lengthy teachers' strike: the government was perceived to have been acting in a high-handed manner in going against the courts.
Were something similar to arise now, there is no one to go on strike, but - and for the moment it is speculation - a federation riposte may be to call for "precautionary measures". Inma Benito, the president, has implied that the federation would not seek these. Not at the moment anyway. If the judge were to rule in favour of any such demand, the tax could be suspended, pending the full judicial review. The consequences would be chaotic.
An emergency decree might be sufficient to stop the appeal in its tracks, but even if it were to be, one wouldn't then rule out the federation making a further challenge. The whole affair seems destined for all-out war.
There's ever more on the related issue of saturation and holiday rentals. Quite by coincidence, the day after writing the article "Is Airbnb The Real Scourge" came a report of actions by anti-Airbnb protesters in Barcelona. They occupied a building where they say the apartments are all illegal tourist lets and pointed out that an owner of one has twelve in all in the city.
The political atmosphere in Barcelona regarding lets is more heated than in Mallorca, and so it is more likely to give rise to such protests (there was also one against "Harmony Of The Seas"). But Barcelona is acting as a lead for others - here and in other European cities - and one can begin to understand that the protesters may have a legitimate point. They argue that far from Airbnb (taken as shorthand to refer to other such sites as well) promoting the so-called collaborative economy, it is fostering a speculative economy that is based on tourist accommodation, a great deal of it illegal. They have some curious allies in this thinking, such as Exceltur, the alliance for touristic excellence, of which leading Mallorcan hoteliers are members.
The Barcelona protesters insist that Airbnb knows full well what is licensed and what isn't, but chooses to ignore the distinction to its own benefit and to the benefits of multiple property owners. The company says that 73% of those who advertise their properties only have the one (which does leave 27% who have more) and that the city's economy benefits to the tune of 740 million euros per annum because of its activities.
The reverse of this percentage, at least where Mallorca is concerned and according to Exceltur, is that 70% of owners have more than one property that is being promoted via Airbnb or other sites.
Who's right and who's wrong in all this? It's another war.
Saturday, March 12, 2016
Podemos Takes Aim At Hoteliers Over Holiday Rentals
Laura Camargo, the Podemos number two in the Balearic parliament, certainly knows how to win friends and influence people. Or rather, she knows how not to win friends because she isn't particularly interested in their being her friends.
We are talking Mallorca's hoteliers and indeed the hoteliers on the other islands. They, says Laura, consider the islands to be their "cortijos", which literally means farmhouses or farm cottages but in a broader sense can be taken as meaning their domains. The hoteliers treat the Balearics like they own them but there are, as Laura has been at pains to point out this week, "many more people who have the right to offer accommodation to the tourists that we receive each year". Podemos has confirmed that it will be taking part in dialogue to arrive at the best possible agreements on the regulation of holiday rentals. And if the tourist tax is anything to go by, then this probably translates as what Podemos wants on holiday rentals will be what the legislation ultimately contains.
As mentioned in this column last week, it is the government's intention to have legislation signed, sealed and delivered within six months. Whether this schedule takes account of all the haggling with Podemos is not known. But legislation is on its way. What it will look like, no one can say with much certainty at this point. Of elements of the law that have been creeping out, we understand that town halls will be able to determine areas which cannot be used for tourist rental (a different emphasis to saying which ones can be used), that there will be a set of quality standards introduced for accommodation, that a maximum number of places will be imposed according to the type of property and that any property has to be five years old in order to be eligible for tourist rental.
The thinking behind this latter point is to prevent speculative developments with tourist rental alone in mind. It isn't one that the Partido Popular is wholly in agreement with. It doesn't want this provision but nor does it want more supply of accommodation. Which sounds as if it remains inherently opposed to a form of regulation which would facilitate greater supply, as in it remains opposed to apartments being openly marketed as tourist rentals.
All will be revealed over the coming months, but in the meantime there have been a couple of revelations this week that make one wonder as to how permissive any holiday rental regulation might be and also make one wonder as to the veracity of the notion that Podemos is behind what are two inextricably linked pieces of legislation: those for the tourist tax and holiday rentals.
The first of these was the lesser of the revelations, as we have known for some time that the tourism minister, Biel Barceló, has concerns about overcrowding because of the sheer volume of tourists in peak season. He said on Monday that "we have to get used to there being limits on beaches and other natural spaces, just like at a cinema or a football stadium". He made much of the fact that the current tourist model generates inequalities, pointing to the time in the 1980s when the Balearics had the highest per capita income in Spain courtesy of six million tourists. With more than double this number now, the Balearics have slipped to seventh in the income stakes.
The problem for Barceló is being able to define the type of limits that might be suitable. The second problem is how such limits might be enforced. But inherent to both these problems, in the immediate short term, is the issue of holiday rentals. More permissive regulation doesn't per se crank up the volume of accommodation to unsustainable levels, but it has to be reasonably permissive in order to tackle the blatant abuses that are being perpetrated and will continue to be without highly effective enforcement. It is this illegal supply that is a contributor to the overcrowding, but so it might be said is the legitimate supply. Barceló was not looking at the immediate short term, rather at five, ten, twenty years from now, but does one conclude that there is to be a strategic objective to cut hotel places?
The third problem for Barceló is that drawing on what was the situation thirty years ago is not a solid argument for basing decisions on in the current day. Apart from anything else, it may be that other regions have caught up rather than the Balearics going backwards. His analysis may well be simplistic.
The second revelation came from "Preferente" on Tuesday this week. An article said that three weeks before the general election in December, Barceló and President Armengol met with the grand hoteliers of the Balearics. They included apparently Fluxá, Escarrer and Barceló (Simón, that is). What was said at this gathering, according to the article, was that Podemos had the government (PSOE and Més) by the short and curlies over the tourist tax, intimating that it was basically Podemos who were driving it.
The hoteliers, it would appear, bought this, though one finds it difficult to believe that they, given who they are, would simply swallow the argument. The implication, though, was that both PSOE and Més were less evangelistic about the tourist tax than may have been thought. PSOE perhaps, but Més? The article then said that Armengol had been lying to the hoteliers and pointed, rightly enough, to the fact that it was PSOE and Més who between them had brought the tourist tax legislation before parliament. Podemos, it shouldn't be forgotten, abstained on the first pass at legislative approval because its demands were not being met in respect of, for instance, geographical distribution of the tax revenue and its sole use for environmental purposes. This isn't to deny that Podemos is highly influential in the drafting of the tax legislation, but for PSOE and Més to have apparently sought to distance themselves from it at that meeting does take some believing.
If nothing else, and if what was said at that meeting is indeed accurate, then it exposes the purely political nature of current tourism decision-making. The tax is one thing, and the holiday rentals will doubtless be another. In truth, this is no way to be running or legislating for Mallorca's principal industry. But then we probably already knew this.
We are talking Mallorca's hoteliers and indeed the hoteliers on the other islands. They, says Laura, consider the islands to be their "cortijos", which literally means farmhouses or farm cottages but in a broader sense can be taken as meaning their domains. The hoteliers treat the Balearics like they own them but there are, as Laura has been at pains to point out this week, "many more people who have the right to offer accommodation to the tourists that we receive each year". Podemos has confirmed that it will be taking part in dialogue to arrive at the best possible agreements on the regulation of holiday rentals. And if the tourist tax is anything to go by, then this probably translates as what Podemos wants on holiday rentals will be what the legislation ultimately contains.
As mentioned in this column last week, it is the government's intention to have legislation signed, sealed and delivered within six months. Whether this schedule takes account of all the haggling with Podemos is not known. But legislation is on its way. What it will look like, no one can say with much certainty at this point. Of elements of the law that have been creeping out, we understand that town halls will be able to determine areas which cannot be used for tourist rental (a different emphasis to saying which ones can be used), that there will be a set of quality standards introduced for accommodation, that a maximum number of places will be imposed according to the type of property and that any property has to be five years old in order to be eligible for tourist rental.
The thinking behind this latter point is to prevent speculative developments with tourist rental alone in mind. It isn't one that the Partido Popular is wholly in agreement with. It doesn't want this provision but nor does it want more supply of accommodation. Which sounds as if it remains inherently opposed to a form of regulation which would facilitate greater supply, as in it remains opposed to apartments being openly marketed as tourist rentals.
All will be revealed over the coming months, but in the meantime there have been a couple of revelations this week that make one wonder as to how permissive any holiday rental regulation might be and also make one wonder as to the veracity of the notion that Podemos is behind what are two inextricably linked pieces of legislation: those for the tourist tax and holiday rentals.
The first of these was the lesser of the revelations, as we have known for some time that the tourism minister, Biel Barceló, has concerns about overcrowding because of the sheer volume of tourists in peak season. He said on Monday that "we have to get used to there being limits on beaches and other natural spaces, just like at a cinema or a football stadium". He made much of the fact that the current tourist model generates inequalities, pointing to the time in the 1980s when the Balearics had the highest per capita income in Spain courtesy of six million tourists. With more than double this number now, the Balearics have slipped to seventh in the income stakes.
The problem for Barceló is being able to define the type of limits that might be suitable. The second problem is how such limits might be enforced. But inherent to both these problems, in the immediate short term, is the issue of holiday rentals. More permissive regulation doesn't per se crank up the volume of accommodation to unsustainable levels, but it has to be reasonably permissive in order to tackle the blatant abuses that are being perpetrated and will continue to be without highly effective enforcement. It is this illegal supply that is a contributor to the overcrowding, but so it might be said is the legitimate supply. Barceló was not looking at the immediate short term, rather at five, ten, twenty years from now, but does one conclude that there is to be a strategic objective to cut hotel places?
The third problem for Barceló is that drawing on what was the situation thirty years ago is not a solid argument for basing decisions on in the current day. Apart from anything else, it may be that other regions have caught up rather than the Balearics going backwards. His analysis may well be simplistic.
The second revelation came from "Preferente" on Tuesday this week. An article said that three weeks before the general election in December, Barceló and President Armengol met with the grand hoteliers of the Balearics. They included apparently Fluxá, Escarrer and Barceló (Simón, that is). What was said at this gathering, according to the article, was that Podemos had the government (PSOE and Més) by the short and curlies over the tourist tax, intimating that it was basically Podemos who were driving it.
The hoteliers, it would appear, bought this, though one finds it difficult to believe that they, given who they are, would simply swallow the argument. The implication, though, was that both PSOE and Més were less evangelistic about the tourist tax than may have been thought. PSOE perhaps, but Més? The article then said that Armengol had been lying to the hoteliers and pointed, rightly enough, to the fact that it was PSOE and Més who between them had brought the tourist tax legislation before parliament. Podemos, it shouldn't be forgotten, abstained on the first pass at legislative approval because its demands were not being met in respect of, for instance, geographical distribution of the tax revenue and its sole use for environmental purposes. This isn't to deny that Podemos is highly influential in the drafting of the tax legislation, but for PSOE and Més to have apparently sought to distance themselves from it at that meeting does take some believing.
If nothing else, and if what was said at that meeting is indeed accurate, then it exposes the purely political nature of current tourism decision-making. The tax is one thing, and the holiday rentals will doubtless be another. In truth, this is no way to be running or legislating for Mallorca's principal industry. But then we probably already knew this.
Wednesday, November 25, 2015
The Finality Of Tourism Law
When the previous government issued its tourism law in the middle of 2012, it was kind enough to do so in different languages. To Castellano and Catalan were added English, German and even Russian: those were the days, before Ukraine, a plummeting ruble and Russian tour operator bankruptcies.
The thinking behind this multi-lingual presentation of law was not one of altruistic education and information for the masses. It had to do with the government's desire to facilitate inward investment. The law, commonly referred to as Delgado's Law after the minister of the time, was just as commonly looked upon as an investor's charter. Despite faults with the law, a disparaging criticism of the avarice of commercial interests was largely misplaced. Delgado's version of tourism revitalisation was property-driven. It didn't meet with everyone's approval, but in general it has to be said that it was a worthy piece of legislation. Mallorca has been undergoing revitalisation, even if it has only been for the benefit of the hoteliers.
The current government has yet to issue its tourism law. It hasn't even drafted it yet. But we have some idea of the type of content insofar as advance publicity has been given to issues such as regulations for private accommodation and all-inclusive hotels. The chances are that it won't be multi-lingual. This is a government in property reverse.
But before we even get to Tourism Law 2016 - if indeed they can rouse themselves sufficiently to enact it next year and are able to reduce the legislative delays caused by the need for dialogue, consensus and general arseing around - we have pre-Tourism Law 2016. This is the law with the pompous title of the Sustainable Tourism Tax, a euphemistic name for tourist tax (or eco-tax, which, supposedly, we are definitely not allowed to use) and one applied in order to foster an impression of its general and common good.
You, or rather the government, can cover a multitude of lack of sins by coining the sustainable moniker. It is a word so widely used that it has lost any meaning it might once have had. Not that anyone has ever known what it means anyway - and still don't - but it sounds good and so therefore it is for the general and common good. The "selling" of a tax is achieved through the vagueness of an adjective.
Although this is a pre-Tourism Law, it has the feel of being the actual law. The government is at pains to describe the tax as "finalista", by which it means that it has specific aims: it is "purpose-oriented", even if we remain in the dark as to which purpose or purposes. It is, therefore, not a general tax, to which most us respond with a Christmasy "ho, ho, ho".
Finalista it may be, and it has the sense of being final. The finality of the tax is supposedly open to public consultation and yet more dialogue and consensus, blah, blah, but its final destination steadfastly ignores consensus with the villains of Delgado's Law, the chief generators of Balearic wealth - the hoteliers.
The discovery that, according to a survey, 80% of the populace agrees with the assertion of Alberto Jarabo of Podemos that hoteliers act against the best interests of the Balearics can only help in bolstering the government's inclination to go against its avowed principles of dialogue and consensus and so grant the hoteliers a diminished or non-existent role in the law's finality. But it is misguided in doing so.
Yes, Delgado's Law went too far in one direction, but the Sustainable Tourism Tax Law and what will be the actual Tourism Law are moving in the opposite way. The tax law feels like the actual law because it is so "finalist" in its hostility towards hotel interests. As someone who is not against the principle of a tourist tax, I find myself increasingly angered by the government's stance and stubbornness. What should be being sought is an approach to tourism, be it with a tax or without, that is genuinely predicated on consensus and not wished for by the banal repetition of government ministers.
Collective social responsibility through a coming-together of government agencies, interest groups and the tourism business sectors should be the objective. It should entail a grand strategy to set out a tourism future that takes account of the aims of various sectors in truly being in the general and common good.
Inma de Benito of the hoteliers' federation has asked Xelo Huertas, the Podemos president of parliament, that the federation be part of the parliamentary process for deciding the tax law. This would only be by committee, but the invitation should be extended. Whether it will be, given Jarabo's antagonism in particular, is doubtful. It would also be foolish. The island's tourism industry cannot be determined by the divisiveness of tax finality.
The thinking behind this multi-lingual presentation of law was not one of altruistic education and information for the masses. It had to do with the government's desire to facilitate inward investment. The law, commonly referred to as Delgado's Law after the minister of the time, was just as commonly looked upon as an investor's charter. Despite faults with the law, a disparaging criticism of the avarice of commercial interests was largely misplaced. Delgado's version of tourism revitalisation was property-driven. It didn't meet with everyone's approval, but in general it has to be said that it was a worthy piece of legislation. Mallorca has been undergoing revitalisation, even if it has only been for the benefit of the hoteliers.
The current government has yet to issue its tourism law. It hasn't even drafted it yet. But we have some idea of the type of content insofar as advance publicity has been given to issues such as regulations for private accommodation and all-inclusive hotels. The chances are that it won't be multi-lingual. This is a government in property reverse.
But before we even get to Tourism Law 2016 - if indeed they can rouse themselves sufficiently to enact it next year and are able to reduce the legislative delays caused by the need for dialogue, consensus and general arseing around - we have pre-Tourism Law 2016. This is the law with the pompous title of the Sustainable Tourism Tax, a euphemistic name for tourist tax (or eco-tax, which, supposedly, we are definitely not allowed to use) and one applied in order to foster an impression of its general and common good.
You, or rather the government, can cover a multitude of lack of sins by coining the sustainable moniker. It is a word so widely used that it has lost any meaning it might once have had. Not that anyone has ever known what it means anyway - and still don't - but it sounds good and so therefore it is for the general and common good. The "selling" of a tax is achieved through the vagueness of an adjective.
Although this is a pre-Tourism Law, it has the feel of being the actual law. The government is at pains to describe the tax as "finalista", by which it means that it has specific aims: it is "purpose-oriented", even if we remain in the dark as to which purpose or purposes. It is, therefore, not a general tax, to which most us respond with a Christmasy "ho, ho, ho".
Finalista it may be, and it has the sense of being final. The finality of the tax is supposedly open to public consultation and yet more dialogue and consensus, blah, blah, but its final destination steadfastly ignores consensus with the villains of Delgado's Law, the chief generators of Balearic wealth - the hoteliers.
The discovery that, according to a survey, 80% of the populace agrees with the assertion of Alberto Jarabo of Podemos that hoteliers act against the best interests of the Balearics can only help in bolstering the government's inclination to go against its avowed principles of dialogue and consensus and so grant the hoteliers a diminished or non-existent role in the law's finality. But it is misguided in doing so.
Yes, Delgado's Law went too far in one direction, but the Sustainable Tourism Tax Law and what will be the actual Tourism Law are moving in the opposite way. The tax law feels like the actual law because it is so "finalist" in its hostility towards hotel interests. As someone who is not against the principle of a tourist tax, I find myself increasingly angered by the government's stance and stubbornness. What should be being sought is an approach to tourism, be it with a tax or without, that is genuinely predicated on consensus and not wished for by the banal repetition of government ministers.
Collective social responsibility through a coming-together of government agencies, interest groups and the tourism business sectors should be the objective. It should entail a grand strategy to set out a tourism future that takes account of the aims of various sectors in truly being in the general and common good.
Inma de Benito of the hoteliers' federation has asked Xelo Huertas, the Podemos president of parliament, that the federation be part of the parliamentary process for deciding the tax law. This would only be by committee, but the invitation should be extended. Whether it will be, given Jarabo's antagonism in particular, is doubtful. It would also be foolish. The island's tourism industry cannot be determined by the divisiveness of tax finality.
Monday, November 16, 2015
Podemos Versus The Hoteliers
80% of Mallorcans can't be wrong. Or can they be? It was one of those website poll things. Do you agree that Mallorca's hoteliers act against the best interests of the Balearics (or words to that effect)? In fact, it was 84% who agreed when I happened to look at the results a few days ago. The question was posed after Dave Spart (the Podemos leader) accused the lovely Inma Benito of the hoteliers' federation and indeed the entire hotelier class of disloyalty towards the Balearics and called upon the whole of the tourism industry (that which isn't hotelier-based presumably) to "disavow" the hoteliers.
Such strength of support may strike you as surprising. Here, after all, is a sector of the economy without which Mallorca would be an underdeveloped society with its people eking out meagre earnings from the sale of artisan craft pots and cabbages at solidarity markets in the island's pueblos, which most of the inhabitants would have long abandoned in order to seek greater riches in other lands. Talk about ingratitude.
There again, one can perhaps understand the support for the Podemos stance. When "Forbes" releases figures which show that leading hoteliers are down to their last billion or so, despite having moaned for several years about lack of profitability, sympathy is likely to be in short supply. Just as it would be at the news that Riu had hoovered up a couple of islands in the Maldives, only for a state of emergency to be declared. No sense of schadenfreude there, then.
Dave and comrade Podemistas were agitated by two things. One was that Inma had gone to London and openly attacked the government of which Podemos isn't officially a part for its temerity in introducing a tourist tax. The worst that Inma came out with, as far as I'm aware, was that she called the tax "anti-business". But never mind, the Podemistas were gunning for her anyway. The other point had to do with the hoteliers raking in small fortunes, enough to keep them in super yachts and Rolexes, while subjecting a downtrodden workforce to 100 hours or so a week hard labour on temporary contracts in return for a couple of euros in their wage packets (I do exaggerate).
It was this, the working terms and conditions, which, one fancies, is why most of the 84% agreed with Dave. And then, just to reinforce the impression that the hoteliers can't abide the Podemistas (if reinforcement were needed), Inma said that she couldn't meet them for what would doubtless be a mutual slanging-match until the day after the general election. At this point, The Boot Girl (Laura Camargo) entered the fray and accused the hoteliers of hiding and of further disloyalty, adding that if she were the head of the hoteliers' federation, she would "never in her life" go to London and criticise the government's tourist tax. Of course, the chances of Laura actually ever being "in her life" the head of the federation are slightly less than zero. Indeed, why Laura would even contemplate being in charge of the hoteliers, when she appears to prefer that they didn't exist, was a curious remark to say the least.
Meanwhile, and following the signing-up of the former chief of the defence staff to the Podemista election ranks, it emerged that contacts had been ongoing between Dave, Pablo Iglesias and Judge Dredd over the possibility that he, Judge José Castro, would also throw his hat into the Podemos election ring. Dave was positively gushing in his praise for the man who has pursued Matas, Urdangarin and others with such vigour and rigour. "A symbolic reference for anti-corruption and democratic regeneration," said Dave. Apparently, Pablo had been on the blower to the judge to once more sound him out about becoming a Podemista. And the judge responded that he was flattered to have been considered but he still had a day job - persecuting the corrupt - for another two years as he had been allowed to delay his retirement.
All good publicity for Podemos no doubt, but potentially a tad awkward for the judge. Defence counsels might even now be considering political neutrality, as Iglesias reckons that the judge would have joined up had he retired when he should have, i.e. in time for the general election. Anyway, 80% of Mallorcans, when asked by an online poll, believed that Judge Dredd was right to decline the polite offer. Were the 80% wrong or right? Let's have an online poll.
Such strength of support may strike you as surprising. Here, after all, is a sector of the economy without which Mallorca would be an underdeveloped society with its people eking out meagre earnings from the sale of artisan craft pots and cabbages at solidarity markets in the island's pueblos, which most of the inhabitants would have long abandoned in order to seek greater riches in other lands. Talk about ingratitude.
There again, one can perhaps understand the support for the Podemos stance. When "Forbes" releases figures which show that leading hoteliers are down to their last billion or so, despite having moaned for several years about lack of profitability, sympathy is likely to be in short supply. Just as it would be at the news that Riu had hoovered up a couple of islands in the Maldives, only for a state of emergency to be declared. No sense of schadenfreude there, then.
Dave and comrade Podemistas were agitated by two things. One was that Inma had gone to London and openly attacked the government of which Podemos isn't officially a part for its temerity in introducing a tourist tax. The worst that Inma came out with, as far as I'm aware, was that she called the tax "anti-business". But never mind, the Podemistas were gunning for her anyway. The other point had to do with the hoteliers raking in small fortunes, enough to keep them in super yachts and Rolexes, while subjecting a downtrodden workforce to 100 hours or so a week hard labour on temporary contracts in return for a couple of euros in their wage packets (I do exaggerate).
It was this, the working terms and conditions, which, one fancies, is why most of the 84% agreed with Dave. And then, just to reinforce the impression that the hoteliers can't abide the Podemistas (if reinforcement were needed), Inma said that she couldn't meet them for what would doubtless be a mutual slanging-match until the day after the general election. At this point, The Boot Girl (Laura Camargo) entered the fray and accused the hoteliers of hiding and of further disloyalty, adding that if she were the head of the hoteliers' federation, she would "never in her life" go to London and criticise the government's tourist tax. Of course, the chances of Laura actually ever being "in her life" the head of the federation are slightly less than zero. Indeed, why Laura would even contemplate being in charge of the hoteliers, when she appears to prefer that they didn't exist, was a curious remark to say the least.
Meanwhile, and following the signing-up of the former chief of the defence staff to the Podemista election ranks, it emerged that contacts had been ongoing between Dave, Pablo Iglesias and Judge Dredd over the possibility that he, Judge José Castro, would also throw his hat into the Podemos election ring. Dave was positively gushing in his praise for the man who has pursued Matas, Urdangarin and others with such vigour and rigour. "A symbolic reference for anti-corruption and democratic regeneration," said Dave. Apparently, Pablo had been on the blower to the judge to once more sound him out about becoming a Podemista. And the judge responded that he was flattered to have been considered but he still had a day job - persecuting the corrupt - for another two years as he had been allowed to delay his retirement.
All good publicity for Podemos no doubt, but potentially a tad awkward for the judge. Defence counsels might even now be considering political neutrality, as Iglesias reckons that the judge would have joined up had he retired when he should have, i.e. in time for the general election. Anyway, 80% of Mallorcans, when asked by an online poll, believed that Judge Dredd was right to decline the polite offer. Were the 80% wrong or right? Let's have an online poll.
Monday, August 03, 2015
Our Ladies Of Wecan
All is not well in the Reform Church of Iglesias. The faithful have started to desert the pews of Saint Pablo and Our Lady of Wecan, seemingly alarmed at the thought that Wecan might weaken Spain by converting it into the Greek Unorthodox Church of Syriza. Had this thought not occurred to them before? Or is it the case that the faithful are only now rumbling Podemos? The easy part was grabbing hold of some power at the ballot box. The less easy part was always going to be convincing the faithful (and others) that, once handed this power, they aren't just a bunch of hairies from the students' union locked in mortal combat with each other in dissecting their own version of Dialectical Materialism rather than being taken seriously.
In former times, English slang gave us the "nit". In strictly linguistic terms, nit means nothing. The nit of slang was someone who was foolish, who did not do sensible things, who had nothing to offer except nittishness and being a nitwit. It would be harsh indeed to suggest that Podemos (We Can) have nothing to offer, because they have plenty, and some of it is sensible. However, they are doing their best to appear to be nits, a bunch of Charlies, some right Herberts, or even left Herberts.
Laura Camargo, considered by some to be the real power behind the Wecan throne in the Balearics of Dave Spart Jarabo, confronted the lovely, indeed immaculate Inmaculada de Benito of the Mallorcan hoteliers federation and launched into a tirade of fraud, worker abuses, exploitation, blah, blah. Laura might have a point, but it became lost in the vitriol. Why did she do it? Probably for public consumption. Wecan were wanting to show the Mallorcan public that they can stand up to the hoteliers, that the hoteliers' days in the sun of power are no more. Unfortunately, and despite a large number of Mallorcans concurring with the view that the hoteliers do have too much power, there is a far greater number who rely on the hoteliers and related businesses. Laura really should learn that she isn't in the students' union and that in the real world one adopts a less strident manner.
Our Lady Laura of Wecan was but one who was indulging in delivering sermons from the pulpit of Saint Pablo. There was also Our Lady Xelo. She informed his Royal Highness that, rather than splash the cash on the thrash at the Almudaina when various politicos and others are invited for some gin 'n' tonics, the moolah should go towards soup kitchens. On balance, one would have to agree with Xelo that this might be, in still-crisis times for many, a preferable deployment of financial resources, and the King, thoroughly admirable man that he is, might even be inclined to agree as well. However, protocol and all that does rather intrude into such affairs. Whether Xelo will ask for a doggy bag for her canapes and cut along with it to the nearest crisis centre after the reception, we will find out.
In former times, English slang gave us the "nit". In strictly linguistic terms, nit means nothing. The nit of slang was someone who was foolish, who did not do sensible things, who had nothing to offer except nittishness and being a nitwit. It would be harsh indeed to suggest that Podemos (We Can) have nothing to offer, because they have plenty, and some of it is sensible. However, they are doing their best to appear to be nits, a bunch of Charlies, some right Herberts, or even left Herberts.
Laura Camargo, considered by some to be the real power behind the Wecan throne in the Balearics of Dave Spart Jarabo, confronted the lovely, indeed immaculate Inmaculada de Benito of the Mallorcan hoteliers federation and launched into a tirade of fraud, worker abuses, exploitation, blah, blah. Laura might have a point, but it became lost in the vitriol. Why did she do it? Probably for public consumption. Wecan were wanting to show the Mallorcan public that they can stand up to the hoteliers, that the hoteliers' days in the sun of power are no more. Unfortunately, and despite a large number of Mallorcans concurring with the view that the hoteliers do have too much power, there is a far greater number who rely on the hoteliers and related businesses. Laura really should learn that she isn't in the students' union and that in the real world one adopts a less strident manner.
Our Lady Laura of Wecan was but one who was indulging in delivering sermons from the pulpit of Saint Pablo. There was also Our Lady Xelo. She informed his Royal Highness that, rather than splash the cash on the thrash at the Almudaina when various politicos and others are invited for some gin 'n' tonics, the moolah should go towards soup kitchens. On balance, one would have to agree with Xelo that this might be, in still-crisis times for many, a preferable deployment of financial resources, and the King, thoroughly admirable man that he is, might even be inclined to agree as well. However, protocol and all that does rather intrude into such affairs. Whether Xelo will ask for a doggy bag for her canapes and cut along with it to the nearest crisis centre after the reception, we will find out.
Saturday, August 01, 2015
The Neglect Of Calas de Mallorca
Calas de Mallorca is a resort that has for years suffered from neglect. Partly this has been because of its origins as an essentially private development which still creates issues for the town hall in Manacor in terms of services. Nevertheless, last year the town hall was stung into taking action when examples of neglect began to appear in the media. So, it showed some initiative, the lack of which has been the focus of criticism of regimes at the town hall over several years when it has come to tourism infrastructure (and not just Calas de Mallorca). It is a resort which has also become a dumping ground for all-inclusive. In this regard it is not unique, but the almost total economy nature of its some 6,000 or so hotel places has bred a form of all-inclusive that reflects the hotel stock and a level of all-inclusive which is said to represent anywhere between 80% and 90% of those places.
The quoting of such figures is always something in which holes can be picked. Data from the Balearic tourism ministry (such as they are) and information from studies give varying percentages as to the level of all-inclusive. A typical figure has been around 33% for the whole of Mallorca, which might just be believable when one takes account of the island's entire hotel stock but is most definitely not believable at the micro level of individual resorts, of which Calas de Mallorca is a good example.
With a new regime at the town hall, the issue of all-inclusive, as it is in other municipalities, has come to the top of the agenda. But like other municipalities, Calvia for example where the mayor has spoken of regulation, Manacor cannot effect any municipal legislation that limits or bars all-inclusive. It can introduce bylaws that might influence aspects of the all-inclusive offer but it can do no more: it is otherwise a matter for regional government.
If the volume of all-inclusive is as it is quoted, there should be a fundamental question being asked: what is the point of Calas de Mallorca as a resort? If general economic welfare is so limited as a consequence of one particular type of accommodation board, then its purpose as a resort is diminished. It is not sustainable, and in the mantra of the current day, it therefore runs counter to the notions of sustainable (aka responsible) tourism that tour operators and some hoteliers make a big issue of, yet singularly fail to practise.
The new regional administration, with its twin policy items of the eco-tax and all-inclusive regulation (yet to be defined), may well have an underlying strategy aimed at reducing tourist numbers. It is a strategy littered with risks, but if these policies, allied to tactics such as the declaration of far more "mature zones" in tourist resorts, were to result in a decline in the number of places in a resort like Calas de Mallorca but the removal of a great deal of that 80 or 90%, then the cost-benefit equation would in all likelihood weigh heavily in favour of general economic benefit for the local economy.
The mature zones, a mechanism for liberalising and incentivising redevelopment but also forcing it, should be applied widely across Mallorca, but it is a tactic which might itself run up against government antagonism towards in-resort investment. What we are not seeing at present is a clear vision of what Biel Barceló, the tourism minister, wants. When he speaks of tourism re-investment facilitated by the eco-tax, how much of this would be directed at the resorts? Even if it were to be, mature zones rely massively on private investment for the tactic to succeed or be given the chance to succeed, and neither Més (certain members of the party at any rate) nor Podemos are currently endearing themselves to the principal sources of such investment - the hoteliers and their backers.
There is a great deal of muddled thinking at present. While reducing tourist numbers, limiting all-inclusive but raising general standards in terms of the type of tourism that Mallorca has are not in themselves bad policies, another side of the coin is that of employment. And into this equation comes the issue of wages, employment conditions and contracts. A report this week that reveals that increased employment levels in the Balearics are predominantly due to short-term, seasonal tourism contracts will come as absolutely no surprise. Podemos, in attacking the hoteliers for a lack of job security, has to accept certain realities of the tourism industry. Firstly, it is seasonal and secondly, there is a very good reason why wages are as they are - low. Podemos (and the government) wants there to be higher quality employment in the industry, implying higher wages, full contracts and so on. But then what is this employment? For the most part, it is unskilled or low-skilled. This shouldn't be an excuse for worker exploitation, but tourism jobs are like they are in Mallorca the world over: that's the reality.
To return to the theme of all-inclusive regulation, it is not one that is only exercising the minds of councillors in Manacor and Calvia and Balearic government ministers. In Benidorm, a commission is being set up to analyse the impact of all-inclusive. The conclusions of its findings will be sent to the regional government (Valencia in this instance). What is significant about this commission is the fact that it involves all interested parties, including the Benidorm hoteliers. Absent from its membership, however, are any tour operators, and as we all know it is they who hold the key, not the hoteliers, many of whom would rather not have to offer all-inclusive (a sentiment which exists in Mallorca as well).
But with the Canaries also setting all-inclusives in their sights, there is a discernible shift in political and business perspective. Finally, after a good couple of decades of all-inclusive there is some momentum and desire to address its impact, and it is a momentum being felt in different parts of Spain. Ultimately, however, the tour operators need to be included, as it is they who wield much of the power. But might they finally wake up to the responsibilities they claim in the marketing-speak of their responsible/sustainable tourism mission statements? Don't hold your breath.
The quoting of such figures is always something in which holes can be picked. Data from the Balearic tourism ministry (such as they are) and information from studies give varying percentages as to the level of all-inclusive. A typical figure has been around 33% for the whole of Mallorca, which might just be believable when one takes account of the island's entire hotel stock but is most definitely not believable at the micro level of individual resorts, of which Calas de Mallorca is a good example.
With a new regime at the town hall, the issue of all-inclusive, as it is in other municipalities, has come to the top of the agenda. But like other municipalities, Calvia for example where the mayor has spoken of regulation, Manacor cannot effect any municipal legislation that limits or bars all-inclusive. It can introduce bylaws that might influence aspects of the all-inclusive offer but it can do no more: it is otherwise a matter for regional government.
If the volume of all-inclusive is as it is quoted, there should be a fundamental question being asked: what is the point of Calas de Mallorca as a resort? If general economic welfare is so limited as a consequence of one particular type of accommodation board, then its purpose as a resort is diminished. It is not sustainable, and in the mantra of the current day, it therefore runs counter to the notions of sustainable (aka responsible) tourism that tour operators and some hoteliers make a big issue of, yet singularly fail to practise.
The new regional administration, with its twin policy items of the eco-tax and all-inclusive regulation (yet to be defined), may well have an underlying strategy aimed at reducing tourist numbers. It is a strategy littered with risks, but if these policies, allied to tactics such as the declaration of far more "mature zones" in tourist resorts, were to result in a decline in the number of places in a resort like Calas de Mallorca but the removal of a great deal of that 80 or 90%, then the cost-benefit equation would in all likelihood weigh heavily in favour of general economic benefit for the local economy.
The mature zones, a mechanism for liberalising and incentivising redevelopment but also forcing it, should be applied widely across Mallorca, but it is a tactic which might itself run up against government antagonism towards in-resort investment. What we are not seeing at present is a clear vision of what Biel Barceló, the tourism minister, wants. When he speaks of tourism re-investment facilitated by the eco-tax, how much of this would be directed at the resorts? Even if it were to be, mature zones rely massively on private investment for the tactic to succeed or be given the chance to succeed, and neither Més (certain members of the party at any rate) nor Podemos are currently endearing themselves to the principal sources of such investment - the hoteliers and their backers.
There is a great deal of muddled thinking at present. While reducing tourist numbers, limiting all-inclusive but raising general standards in terms of the type of tourism that Mallorca has are not in themselves bad policies, another side of the coin is that of employment. And into this equation comes the issue of wages, employment conditions and contracts. A report this week that reveals that increased employment levels in the Balearics are predominantly due to short-term, seasonal tourism contracts will come as absolutely no surprise. Podemos, in attacking the hoteliers for a lack of job security, has to accept certain realities of the tourism industry. Firstly, it is seasonal and secondly, there is a very good reason why wages are as they are - low. Podemos (and the government) wants there to be higher quality employment in the industry, implying higher wages, full contracts and so on. But then what is this employment? For the most part, it is unskilled or low-skilled. This shouldn't be an excuse for worker exploitation, but tourism jobs are like they are in Mallorca the world over: that's the reality.
To return to the theme of all-inclusive regulation, it is not one that is only exercising the minds of councillors in Manacor and Calvia and Balearic government ministers. In Benidorm, a commission is being set up to analyse the impact of all-inclusive. The conclusions of its findings will be sent to the regional government (Valencia in this instance). What is significant about this commission is the fact that it involves all interested parties, including the Benidorm hoteliers. Absent from its membership, however, are any tour operators, and as we all know it is they who hold the key, not the hoteliers, many of whom would rather not have to offer all-inclusive (a sentiment which exists in Mallorca as well).
But with the Canaries also setting all-inclusives in their sights, there is a discernible shift in political and business perspective. Finally, after a good couple of decades of all-inclusive there is some momentum and desire to address its impact, and it is a momentum being felt in different parts of Spain. Ultimately, however, the tour operators need to be included, as it is they who wield much of the power. But might they finally wake up to the responsibilities they claim in the marketing-speak of their responsible/sustainable tourism mission statements? Don't hold your breath.
Saturday, May 30, 2015
Elections: Where do they leave tourism?
Pablo Piñero, the president of Grupo Piñero, of which the Bahia Principe hotels and resorts is one part, sounded a warning before the regional election that the Balearics would be in danger if it was not governed by the Partido Popular. He considered that parties such as Podemos lacked people with the necessary abilities for tourism decision-making in government, comparing the alternative parties with the people that the PP has had at its disposal in government: "great professionals" who have benefited everyone and who have created thousands of jobs. He also attacked the idea of there being an eco-tax. Mallorca and Spain had, not so long ago, been on the point of bankruptcy, why would there now be an eco-tax, one that would be a repetition of a previous mistake?
To say that the elections in the Balearics (and everywhere else in Spain) have dominated tourism matters over the past few days would be an understatement. But not everyone appears to be as concerned as Sr. Piñero was prior to voting day. For example, Juan José Hidalgo, the president of Globalia (which includes Air Europa and Be Live hotels), said that he didn't really see a problem, believing that there would be talks and negotiations with newcomers to government to ensure that everything that is best for Spain will be done. Everyone should take a long hard look at tourism and talk, he suggested, and so respect a rule to create wealth and opportunities. He doesn't think that this "simple rule" will change.
Of course, there are those who believe that things will change. Dramatically so. The possibility of there being an eco-tax in the Balearics has become more likely as a consequence of last Sunday's voting. This might well prove to be unpopular with some, but what about proposals regarding private accommodation for holiday rental, all-inclusives and others?
The belief had been that a shift to the left at the election would lead to a coalition government headed by PSOE's Francina Armengol. This may well prove to have been wrong. Within tourism circles, and others, the belief now is that Biel Barceló of the Més socialists-nationalists could well become president of a PSOE-Més-Podemos triumvirate: he would be far more acceptable to Podemos, and as Més and Podemos together command more seats in the new parliament than PSOE, he may well be destined to become president.
The Més tourism programme does, therefore, require looking at. The eco-tax is one element of it. Otherwise, it refers to regulation of all-inclusives and of private accommodation. What this regulation would be precisely is not as yet clear, but the implication is that there would be restrictions introduced on the former and permissiveness introduced for the latter: essentially, therefore, what a lot of people have been calling for. Més is also proposing that there be tax incentives to facilitate a lengthening of the tourism season. Again, there have been many calls for precisely this type of fiscal intervention to encourage hotels and other establishments to remain open in the off-season.
While alarm bells in the tourism sector will have been ringing since Sunday, the Més programme is not especially radical. Clearly there will be concerns that investment might be undermined, but perhaps Sr. Hidalgo's rather relaxed attitude will prove to be more appropriate than Sr. Piñero's anxiety. It is certainly the case that the industry would love there to be a coalition tie-up between the Partido Popular and PSOE (and if Més were so insistent about having its man as president might this even yet happen?), but in the absence of such an alliance, the industry was alert to the proposals from Més and others, which is why discussions were taking place before the election - typified by the hoteliers' federation meeting with all the parties.
Perhaps the greatest uncertainty lies with the somewhat vague references to a "new model" of tourism. Més and Podemos have alluded to a tourism which affords greater benefits to all and not just a limited sector of society, primarily the hoteliers, and it will be with they - the hoteliers - who a left-leaning administration will have its greatest battles. But were there to be restrictions on new hotel building and on all-inclusives as well as a system that permits more tourism commercialisation of private accommodation (and maybe an airline for Mallorca), would these measures prove to be widely unpopular? And, much though the possibility of an eco-tax has been criticised, it might come as a surprise to discover that the principle of such a tax is one that does also have a good deal of support - assuming one believes opinion surveys, that is.
To say that the elections in the Balearics (and everywhere else in Spain) have dominated tourism matters over the past few days would be an understatement. But not everyone appears to be as concerned as Sr. Piñero was prior to voting day. For example, Juan José Hidalgo, the president of Globalia (which includes Air Europa and Be Live hotels), said that he didn't really see a problem, believing that there would be talks and negotiations with newcomers to government to ensure that everything that is best for Spain will be done. Everyone should take a long hard look at tourism and talk, he suggested, and so respect a rule to create wealth and opportunities. He doesn't think that this "simple rule" will change.
Of course, there are those who believe that things will change. Dramatically so. The possibility of there being an eco-tax in the Balearics has become more likely as a consequence of last Sunday's voting. This might well prove to be unpopular with some, but what about proposals regarding private accommodation for holiday rental, all-inclusives and others?
The belief had been that a shift to the left at the election would lead to a coalition government headed by PSOE's Francina Armengol. This may well prove to have been wrong. Within tourism circles, and others, the belief now is that Biel Barceló of the Més socialists-nationalists could well become president of a PSOE-Més-Podemos triumvirate: he would be far more acceptable to Podemos, and as Més and Podemos together command more seats in the new parliament than PSOE, he may well be destined to become president.
The Més tourism programme does, therefore, require looking at. The eco-tax is one element of it. Otherwise, it refers to regulation of all-inclusives and of private accommodation. What this regulation would be precisely is not as yet clear, but the implication is that there would be restrictions introduced on the former and permissiveness introduced for the latter: essentially, therefore, what a lot of people have been calling for. Més is also proposing that there be tax incentives to facilitate a lengthening of the tourism season. Again, there have been many calls for precisely this type of fiscal intervention to encourage hotels and other establishments to remain open in the off-season.
While alarm bells in the tourism sector will have been ringing since Sunday, the Més programme is not especially radical. Clearly there will be concerns that investment might be undermined, but perhaps Sr. Hidalgo's rather relaxed attitude will prove to be more appropriate than Sr. Piñero's anxiety. It is certainly the case that the industry would love there to be a coalition tie-up between the Partido Popular and PSOE (and if Més were so insistent about having its man as president might this even yet happen?), but in the absence of such an alliance, the industry was alert to the proposals from Més and others, which is why discussions were taking place before the election - typified by the hoteliers' federation meeting with all the parties.
Perhaps the greatest uncertainty lies with the somewhat vague references to a "new model" of tourism. Més and Podemos have alluded to a tourism which affords greater benefits to all and not just a limited sector of society, primarily the hoteliers, and it will be with they - the hoteliers - who a left-leaning administration will have its greatest battles. But were there to be restrictions on new hotel building and on all-inclusives as well as a system that permits more tourism commercialisation of private accommodation (and maybe an airline for Mallorca), would these measures prove to be widely unpopular? And, much though the possibility of an eco-tax has been criticised, it might come as a surprise to discover that the principle of such a tax is one that does also have a good deal of support - assuming one believes opinion surveys, that is.
Friday, May 01, 2015
Tourist Tax - Again
Put tourist tax and Podemos together and place them on the front pages, and you can be certain of a reaction. And there was a reaction. Strange that the discussion of a possible return to a tourist tax that has been mooted by other parties - a discussion that has been had for several months - should not cause a similar reaction. That's the power of Podemos perhaps.
What was rather lost was the fact that Podemos were only considering a tax. It is a possibility, but they pointed out that they would look at the economic viability of such a tax and also at whether there was public support for it. A few days later, the Podemos leader in the Balearics, Alberto Jarabo, implied that the party might well not pursue the idea of a tax. This came up at a long-anticipated meeting with the Mallorcan hoteliers: the two haven't previously had any real dialogue. Jarabo insisted that the hoteliers "would not dictate laws", one of which would relate to a tourist tax, but his stance was less antagonistic than might have been expected. Where a tax is concerned, it would be a matter that would take account of opinion of different sectors and of experts.
The hoteliers are of course against a tax. They would prefer that taxes in general were lowered, though they didn't receive any hope that the tourist rate of IVA (10%) will be cut: Mariano Rajoy has ruled it out once more. The Partido Popular, natural allies of the hoteliers, is finding that support for it is waning somewhat. The tourism industry in general is said to be looking increasingly favourably on Albert Rivera's Ciudadanos (C's) party, with the Balearics being one of two regions of Spain where industry voices in favour of the C's are the loudest: Madrid is the other.
Podemos is not the only party to have been holding talks with the hoteliers: PSOE has been as well. Inma de Benito, the vice-president of the hoteliers' federation, called for PSOE to ensure that there would be stability from any pact of the left following the election. Francina Armengol, PSOE's leader, responded that stability has not always existed during the current legislature, as there have been three education ministers and three health ministers. What this had to do with tourism was not entirely clear, though she might have mentioned that there have also been two tourism ministers, albeit that these are two fewer than during the last administration that PSOE headed, when there were four.
While the hint of a tourist tax was generating controversy and opposition, a report came out which showed that in destinations where a tourist tax has been introduced - and the principle of a tax is widespread - it has had no harmful effect on tourism. Catalonia is one of these destinations, as I pointed out in this column last week. Away from Spain, there are direct competitors to Mallorca which have a tax. Croatia is one. The tariff varies according to a categorisation of towns and cities, with the highest rate being seven kuna per day in high season: slightly less than one euro. Turkey does things a little differently: it charges for a tourist visa.
What was rather lost was the fact that Podemos were only considering a tax. It is a possibility, but they pointed out that they would look at the economic viability of such a tax and also at whether there was public support for it. A few days later, the Podemos leader in the Balearics, Alberto Jarabo, implied that the party might well not pursue the idea of a tax. This came up at a long-anticipated meeting with the Mallorcan hoteliers: the two haven't previously had any real dialogue. Jarabo insisted that the hoteliers "would not dictate laws", one of which would relate to a tourist tax, but his stance was less antagonistic than might have been expected. Where a tax is concerned, it would be a matter that would take account of opinion of different sectors and of experts.
The hoteliers are of course against a tax. They would prefer that taxes in general were lowered, though they didn't receive any hope that the tourist rate of IVA (10%) will be cut: Mariano Rajoy has ruled it out once more. The Partido Popular, natural allies of the hoteliers, is finding that support for it is waning somewhat. The tourism industry in general is said to be looking increasingly favourably on Albert Rivera's Ciudadanos (C's) party, with the Balearics being one of two regions of Spain where industry voices in favour of the C's are the loudest: Madrid is the other.
Podemos is not the only party to have been holding talks with the hoteliers: PSOE has been as well. Inma de Benito, the vice-president of the hoteliers' federation, called for PSOE to ensure that there would be stability from any pact of the left following the election. Francina Armengol, PSOE's leader, responded that stability has not always existed during the current legislature, as there have been three education ministers and three health ministers. What this had to do with tourism was not entirely clear, though she might have mentioned that there have also been two tourism ministers, albeit that these are two fewer than during the last administration that PSOE headed, when there were four.
While the hint of a tourist tax was generating controversy and opposition, a report came out which showed that in destinations where a tourist tax has been introduced - and the principle of a tax is widespread - it has had no harmful effect on tourism. Catalonia is one of these destinations, as I pointed out in this column last week. Away from Spain, there are direct competitors to Mallorca which have a tax. Croatia is one. The tariff varies according to a categorisation of towns and cities, with the highest rate being seven kuna per day in high season: slightly less than one euro. Turkey does things a little differently: it charges for a tourist visa.
Friday, February 27, 2015
The Battles For Mallorca's Tourism
Pre-election skirmishes they may be, but battle lines are nevertheless being drawn in the velvety white sands of Mallorca's tourism. Following the revelation (one that was not in the least bit surprising) of the eco-tax being revived by a pact of parties on the left, the Mallorca Hotel Party (aka Federation) and its presidential candidate, Inma de Benito, came out all guns blazing, seeking to shoot down eco-tax revivalism before it has any chance of being truly re-born. There was as little surprise at the hoteliers' objections as there had been at the left's rediscovered love affair with the tax. Meanwhile, Tourism Public Enemy Number One, the secretary-general of Podemos in the Balearics, Alberto Jarabo, had raised hackles sufficiently well for Calvia's Partido Popular to go into full anti-Podemos mode. At the council meeting, Jarabo's "threats" to the hotels were being condemned by PP-ites, desperately worried that they might be out of jobs come May.
Jarabo had of course riled some within the ranks of Podemos itself, and reactions like those of the Calvia PP might be said to give too much prominence to someone whose grasp on tourism may not be all that it seems. When Jarabo was justifying the return of the eco-tax, he referred to its implementation in Catalonia and Madrid. He was right on Catalonia but he was wrong about Madrid (and this, despite the fact that he comes from Madrid). There is no tourist tax in Madrid. Still, we have become used to Majorcan politicians having only limited knowledge of tourism matters. Bauzá once suggested that the Baltic countries were competitors to Mallorca's summer tourism. Prior to this assertion, no one else had ever made such a claim, and they certainly haven't done so since.
Someone who does have intimate understanding of Mallorca's tourism is Calvia town hall veteran Jaime Martínez. The larger than your average tourism minister bear has such deep knowledge that it is produced in a 50-page document replete with many-coloured graphs and pie charts, statistics and percentages. The "balance" of Balearics tourism in 2014 was presented for us all to see, and we could only but admire a ministerial ability to use presentation software. Before publishing this consultants' dream of a document, Jaime had been telling us how positive January's tourism had been. He stopped short of describing it as "historic" (one of his favoured adjectives) but a 21% increase in January's international tourism was cause for celebration and for confirming that the ministry's paltry promotional spend on travel fairs and blogger trips was paying off. However, when one considered the numbers for all of January's tourism, it became apparent that half of it was made up Spanish pensionistas, whose spend is just a fraction above zero, while state-subsidised pensioners from countries like Denmark were also in the mix (and they spend only a fraction more than their Spanish counterparts) as were - because tourist arrival statistics do not discriminate - all the various cycling teams, such as Sky and their entourages.
Jarabo had of course riled some within the ranks of Podemos itself, and reactions like those of the Calvia PP might be said to give too much prominence to someone whose grasp on tourism may not be all that it seems. When Jarabo was justifying the return of the eco-tax, he referred to its implementation in Catalonia and Madrid. He was right on Catalonia but he was wrong about Madrid (and this, despite the fact that he comes from Madrid). There is no tourist tax in Madrid. Still, we have become used to Majorcan politicians having only limited knowledge of tourism matters. Bauzá once suggested that the Baltic countries were competitors to Mallorca's summer tourism. Prior to this assertion, no one else had ever made such a claim, and they certainly haven't done so since.
Someone who does have intimate understanding of Mallorca's tourism is Calvia town hall veteran Jaime Martínez. The larger than your average tourism minister bear has such deep knowledge that it is produced in a 50-page document replete with many-coloured graphs and pie charts, statistics and percentages. The "balance" of Balearics tourism in 2014 was presented for us all to see, and we could only but admire a ministerial ability to use presentation software. Before publishing this consultants' dream of a document, Jaime had been telling us how positive January's tourism had been. He stopped short of describing it as "historic" (one of his favoured adjectives) but a 21% increase in January's international tourism was cause for celebration and for confirming that the ministry's paltry promotional spend on travel fairs and blogger trips was paying off. However, when one considered the numbers for all of January's tourism, it became apparent that half of it was made up Spanish pensionistas, whose spend is just a fraction above zero, while state-subsidised pensioners from countries like Denmark were also in the mix (and they spend only a fraction more than their Spanish counterparts) as were - because tourist arrival statistics do not discriminate - all the various cycling teams, such as Sky and their entourages.
Wednesday, February 25, 2015
It's Back: The eco-tax
So, it's pretty much official. It has yet to be ratified, but a Balearics eco-tax, or a tax on tourists under some other name, will in all likelihood feature in the manifestos of Podemos, Més and PSOE. If, as seems possible, these three parties form a coalition government, an eco-tax it almost certainly will be.
It comes as no surprise that Podemos and Més should favour such a tax. PSOE is more of a surprise. I had previously doubted that PSOE would wish to revisit the crash scene of a tax it was responsible for introducing during its first administration (the pact of 1999-2003). The PSOE hierarchy might, when push comes to manifesto shove, take the view that it is too emotive an issue and too much of a risk, but Cosme Bonet, one of the party's electoral programme co-ordinators, appears to believe it is a risk worth taking in order that "tourism contributes to the conservation of the environment". He prefers to not refer to the tax as an eco one, but eco-tax is precisely what it would be.
Bonet has also said that it would be a tax with the consensus of the tourism sector. If he believes there will be consensus, he is probably deluding himself. The hoteliers, for one, will take a great deal of persuading. It was, after all, they who got the Matas Partido Popular administration from 2003 to abandon PSOE's unpopular tax. There again, the hoteliers had every reason to have been indignant with the old tax. It was they who shouldered the burden for its collection. One of the flaws of the eco-tax was that it was discriminatory; it was not applied to non-hotel accommodation.
This time, as far as the Més spokesperson David Abril is concerned, the hoteliers will not be singled out. The tax would be universal, and by that he means the inclusion of private holiday accommodation, currently not regulated, that Més would regulate. As PSOE has previously suggested that it would also seek regulation and as Podemos has intimated as much, a tax would apply more widely, just as it does in Catalonia, where private accommodation is properly registered and regulated. But this will hardly be a move to mollify the hoteliers or guarantee a consensus.
Tourist taxes are the flavour of the moment and not only among the Balearics left. In the Canaries, the Nueva Canarias party has presented a proposal for a tax to the regional parliament. Its purpose would be to raise additional funds for modernising outdated resorts and tourist services. The party reckons that 100 million euros could be raised. The hoteliers in the Canaries are dead against the idea. Among reasons for their objections is the Balearics eco-tax fiasco. Others include arguments that the sector is over-taxed as it is and that far too little of the revenue raised by the Canaries' tourism sector actually finds its way back into the system. This is a reasonable argument. The tourism sector generates tax revenues of over 1,500 million euros annually, yet, as an example, only 17 million are earmarked for tourism promotion (which is still a lot more than in the Balearics). It is an argument which, not for the first time, raises questions as to how tax revenues raised by the regions are then redistributed and used.
In Madrid, the PSM (Madrid socialist party) wants to introduce a tourist tax, one that has been spoken about for years but regularly rejected. The difference here though is that it would be a tax for a city, and there are plenty of examples of European cities which have such a tax. The Canaries' objections refer to the fact that tourist taxes are applied to cities and not tourist regions, but they then run up against one very important exception. Catalonia. Its tax is for the whole region and so includes tourist areas such as the Costa Brava as well as Barcelona.
Catalonia's experience of a tourist tax was always going to be one closely observed by other regions of Spain; it hasn't had any harmful impact. It is a tax that isn't too onerous (ninety cents a night is a typical rate) and that is limited in terms of the number of overnight stays: for a two-week holiday, for instance, it only applies to a maximum of seven nights. But Catalonia is not Mallorca and nor is it Tenerife. It clearly has hugely popular mass-tourism areas, but these don't generate quite the same media interest that Mallorca does. The old eco-tax was as much a PR disaster because of negative international media coverage as it was a disaster of discriminatory implementation. Any new tax would come in for the same treatment; the same hue and cry. Would it, therefore, be too great a risk?
It comes as no surprise that Podemos and Més should favour such a tax. PSOE is more of a surprise. I had previously doubted that PSOE would wish to revisit the crash scene of a tax it was responsible for introducing during its first administration (the pact of 1999-2003). The PSOE hierarchy might, when push comes to manifesto shove, take the view that it is too emotive an issue and too much of a risk, but Cosme Bonet, one of the party's electoral programme co-ordinators, appears to believe it is a risk worth taking in order that "tourism contributes to the conservation of the environment". He prefers to not refer to the tax as an eco one, but eco-tax is precisely what it would be.
Bonet has also said that it would be a tax with the consensus of the tourism sector. If he believes there will be consensus, he is probably deluding himself. The hoteliers, for one, will take a great deal of persuading. It was, after all, they who got the Matas Partido Popular administration from 2003 to abandon PSOE's unpopular tax. There again, the hoteliers had every reason to have been indignant with the old tax. It was they who shouldered the burden for its collection. One of the flaws of the eco-tax was that it was discriminatory; it was not applied to non-hotel accommodation.
This time, as far as the Més spokesperson David Abril is concerned, the hoteliers will not be singled out. The tax would be universal, and by that he means the inclusion of private holiday accommodation, currently not regulated, that Més would regulate. As PSOE has previously suggested that it would also seek regulation and as Podemos has intimated as much, a tax would apply more widely, just as it does in Catalonia, where private accommodation is properly registered and regulated. But this will hardly be a move to mollify the hoteliers or guarantee a consensus.
Tourist taxes are the flavour of the moment and not only among the Balearics left. In the Canaries, the Nueva Canarias party has presented a proposal for a tax to the regional parliament. Its purpose would be to raise additional funds for modernising outdated resorts and tourist services. The party reckons that 100 million euros could be raised. The hoteliers in the Canaries are dead against the idea. Among reasons for their objections is the Balearics eco-tax fiasco. Others include arguments that the sector is over-taxed as it is and that far too little of the revenue raised by the Canaries' tourism sector actually finds its way back into the system. This is a reasonable argument. The tourism sector generates tax revenues of over 1,500 million euros annually, yet, as an example, only 17 million are earmarked for tourism promotion (which is still a lot more than in the Balearics). It is an argument which, not for the first time, raises questions as to how tax revenues raised by the regions are then redistributed and used.
In Madrid, the PSM (Madrid socialist party) wants to introduce a tourist tax, one that has been spoken about for years but regularly rejected. The difference here though is that it would be a tax for a city, and there are plenty of examples of European cities which have such a tax. The Canaries' objections refer to the fact that tourist taxes are applied to cities and not tourist regions, but they then run up against one very important exception. Catalonia. Its tax is for the whole region and so includes tourist areas such as the Costa Brava as well as Barcelona.
Catalonia's experience of a tourist tax was always going to be one closely observed by other regions of Spain; it hasn't had any harmful impact. It is a tax that isn't too onerous (ninety cents a night is a typical rate) and that is limited in terms of the number of overnight stays: for a two-week holiday, for instance, it only applies to a maximum of seven nights. But Catalonia is not Mallorca and nor is it Tenerife. It clearly has hugely popular mass-tourism areas, but these don't generate quite the same media interest that Mallorca does. The old eco-tax was as much a PR disaster because of negative international media coverage as it was a disaster of discriminatory implementation. Any new tax would come in for the same treatment; the same hue and cry. Would it, therefore, be too great a risk?
Wednesday, February 18, 2015
The Hotelier-Podemos Power Game
Alberto Jarabo. Note the name. You'll be hearing a lot about him over the next weeks and months. He is a maker of documentary films dedicated to social issues. He does not have a political background. It is unlikely but not inconceivable that he could be the next president of the Balearics. Jarabo has been elected as the secretary-general of Podemos in the Balearics and so his name will probably top the Podemos list when the regional parliamentary election comes around.
Not having a political background is no barrier to an aspiring Podemos politician. Indeed, it is the preferred model. Anyone who has held office with an established political party is deemed unsuitable. Alberto is, therefore, cast from the mould that Pablo Iglesias has shaped. So far, so good, but might there prove to be one particular obstacle for Alberto? He isn't Mallorcan. He isn't from the Balearics. He is from Madrid. He has lived in Mallorca for fifteen years. But a "madrileño" potentially gaining high political office in the Balearics? One wonders how well this might play with a parochial electorate, even one minded to give the "casta" of the PP and PSOE an almighty kicking.
Non-Mallorcan or not, Alberto and the Balearics Podemos prominenti are making all the right noises, unless you happen to be a hotelier, in which case you would prefer not to have to listen. The hoteliers will lose their political influence, says Alberto. "The excessive power of the hotel lobby," adds Laura Camargo, the Podemos secretary, has created the problem of "how wealth is generated" in the Balearics. This attack on the hoteliers was only to have been expected. After all, the hoteliers had got their retaliation in first. Last week Miguel Fluxá of Iberostar spoke of his concern that a "utopian government could fall into the hands of people who do not understand economics". One of his executives, the hoteliers federation president, Aurelio Vázquez, said much the same thing. The founder of Meliá, Gabriel Escarrer Julià, found it "incredible that we are considering the possibility of the triumph of a communist or populist system in a country as advanced as Spain".
When Jarabo talks about breaking down the "monoculture" of tourism in the Balearics, there can surely be few who would disagree with him. But he appreciates that tourism is the prime generator of wealth. Podemos aren't about to kill the tourism goose and its golden egg but they are about to emasculate hotelier power and the "coalition" formed between the PP and the hoteliers. There will be many among the electorate who will back them on this. As I noted recently, there is no real love among Mallorcans for the big hoteliers, and in the participative spirit of Podemos (and others who are coming to this way of thinking), the hoteliers might take note that a perception of aloofness requires altering; they need to engage far better with their communities.
For all that Podemos might want to deprive the hoteliers of their power, they will know full well how much of a power they are up against. The hotel lobby goes well beyond commercial interests. It is a political entity in its own right and its political nature is about to be strengthened. The federation has changed its rules in order to allow a non-hotelier to be its next president. Vázquez's successor will be Inma de Benito, a hotelier-politician, and she has also been getting hotelier retaliation in first. What does one make of her call to political parties to not allow any further consumption of land for new hotel building beyond existing provisions? Does one detect the sight of a rug being pulled from under Podemos through the expedience of a new-found environmental evangelism on behalf of the hoteliers? It may be a very adroit move on her behalf. See, she is a hotelier-politician.
But then, we are at present in a state of speculation. Podemos haven't won anything yet. Nevertheless, the hoteliers (and others) have to take them seriously, even if they will hope that opinion poll support does not translate into actual votes or that Podemos trip up. The investigation into the financial affairs of Podemos leading light Juan Carlos Monedero is one way in which Podemos may stumble. Another source of slip-up is the connection that won't go away - Venezuela. To suggestions of funding for Podemos can be added the extraordinary threat by Venezuela's president, Nicolás Maduro, to expropriate property and interests of Spanish companies, such as Meliá, if they don't put pressure on the Rajoy government to stop its campaign against Podemos and charges of links to the Venezuelan regime.
For all that the Mallorcans might not love their big hoteliers, they are unlikely to take kindly to Venezuela sticking its nose in. With friends like that etc. and of a madrileño in Mallorca, to boot.
Not having a political background is no barrier to an aspiring Podemos politician. Indeed, it is the preferred model. Anyone who has held office with an established political party is deemed unsuitable. Alberto is, therefore, cast from the mould that Pablo Iglesias has shaped. So far, so good, but might there prove to be one particular obstacle for Alberto? He isn't Mallorcan. He isn't from the Balearics. He is from Madrid. He has lived in Mallorca for fifteen years. But a "madrileño" potentially gaining high political office in the Balearics? One wonders how well this might play with a parochial electorate, even one minded to give the "casta" of the PP and PSOE an almighty kicking.
Non-Mallorcan or not, Alberto and the Balearics Podemos prominenti are making all the right noises, unless you happen to be a hotelier, in which case you would prefer not to have to listen. The hoteliers will lose their political influence, says Alberto. "The excessive power of the hotel lobby," adds Laura Camargo, the Podemos secretary, has created the problem of "how wealth is generated" in the Balearics. This attack on the hoteliers was only to have been expected. After all, the hoteliers had got their retaliation in first. Last week Miguel Fluxá of Iberostar spoke of his concern that a "utopian government could fall into the hands of people who do not understand economics". One of his executives, the hoteliers federation president, Aurelio Vázquez, said much the same thing. The founder of Meliá, Gabriel Escarrer Julià, found it "incredible that we are considering the possibility of the triumph of a communist or populist system in a country as advanced as Spain".
When Jarabo talks about breaking down the "monoculture" of tourism in the Balearics, there can surely be few who would disagree with him. But he appreciates that tourism is the prime generator of wealth. Podemos aren't about to kill the tourism goose and its golden egg but they are about to emasculate hotelier power and the "coalition" formed between the PP and the hoteliers. There will be many among the electorate who will back them on this. As I noted recently, there is no real love among Mallorcans for the big hoteliers, and in the participative spirit of Podemos (and others who are coming to this way of thinking), the hoteliers might take note that a perception of aloofness requires altering; they need to engage far better with their communities.
For all that Podemos might want to deprive the hoteliers of their power, they will know full well how much of a power they are up against. The hotel lobby goes well beyond commercial interests. It is a political entity in its own right and its political nature is about to be strengthened. The federation has changed its rules in order to allow a non-hotelier to be its next president. Vázquez's successor will be Inma de Benito, a hotelier-politician, and she has also been getting hotelier retaliation in first. What does one make of her call to political parties to not allow any further consumption of land for new hotel building beyond existing provisions? Does one detect the sight of a rug being pulled from under Podemos through the expedience of a new-found environmental evangelism on behalf of the hoteliers? It may be a very adroit move on her behalf. See, she is a hotelier-politician.
But then, we are at present in a state of speculation. Podemos haven't won anything yet. Nevertheless, the hoteliers (and others) have to take them seriously, even if they will hope that opinion poll support does not translate into actual votes or that Podemos trip up. The investigation into the financial affairs of Podemos leading light Juan Carlos Monedero is one way in which Podemos may stumble. Another source of slip-up is the connection that won't go away - Venezuela. To suggestions of funding for Podemos can be added the extraordinary threat by Venezuela's president, Nicolás Maduro, to expropriate property and interests of Spanish companies, such as Meliá, if they don't put pressure on the Rajoy government to stop its campaign against Podemos and charges of links to the Venezuelan regime.
For all that the Mallorcans might not love their big hoteliers, they are unlikely to take kindly to Venezuela sticking its nose in. With friends like that etc. and of a madrileño in Mallorca, to boot.
Monday, February 09, 2015
Heroes And Villains: Mallorca's hoteliers
The regional tourism minister, Jaime Martínez, remarked the other day that, though Mallorca's main hotelier groups were investing heavily in overseas markets, they were still also investing in Mallorca. If one were being cynical, one could consider this final clause to be a defence against a widely levelled accusation: that these main hoteliers are far more interested in developments in foreign lands than in ones in their own small land.
Quite clearly the hoteliers are investing in Mallorca. Meliá we know all about, but of others? Well, Iberostar has been spending a pretty centimo or two in Cala Millor and Playa de Palma, where Riu is likewise engaged in putting up investment cash. There are plenty of other examples. But for any one or two investments on the island, greater investment activity abroad can be pointed to. To take Riu as an example, between 2014 and 2016 it will have invested in, had built or acquired hotels in Aruba, Mauritius, Morocco, Tunisia, Sri Lanka and New York, to say nothing of developments in Bulgaria and Tenerife. Though Riu has decided to abandon Cuba, its large fellow Mallorcan players are quite happy to take a deeper plunge in the scramble for the Castro-lite Cuba, now undergoing a relationship normalisation with the White House.
All of this overseas activity is, therefore, picked up on and used as evidence for the prosecution in damning the large hoteliers for seeking ever greater riches on foreign shores and leaving poor Mallorca to a slow death of comparative lack of quality and investment. How can these companies, these Mallorcans do such a thing?
It's all nonsense of course. Mallorca's "Big Four" (Meliá, Riu, Iberostar, Barceló) and some of the smaller pretenders to this quartet are global businesses. The clue to their interest in foreign investment lies with the adjective. Global businesses don't become global businesses by channelling all their wealth into markets with limited (very limited) scope for growth; and Mallorca offers very limited scope, especially for new developments. They act in accordance with principles of growth that are relevant to any industry: if you have built a strong home market with limited further opportunity, then you look elsewhere, especially when the industry you serve - tourism - is as avaricious for new destinations as it is.
Do Mallorcans (and indeed foreign residents living in Mallorca) love the Big Four and the other large hoteliers? Those who are employed by them or who have businesses that supply them would probably say yes. But as for everyone else?
The people who criticise the apparent neglect of Mallorca in favour of global development are probably among the ones who also harangue the hoteliers for their opposition to the private holiday accommodation sector. The hoteliers are, therefore, damned whatever they do. Invest much more heavily in Mallorca, and they'll get slammed for their attempts to further dominate the island's accommodation market and for being the sole beneficiaries of Delgado-Martínez Law, i.e. the 2012 tourism bill. Plough millions upon millions into some desert island, and they are branded traitors on account of their imperialist ambitions at the expense of little old Mallorca. And, to compound the apparent felony of imperialism, it is these very hotel groups which have exported know-how that has enabled other destinations to grow. Treachery.
The Big Four and others should be businesses of which Mallorcans can be proud. They are Mallorca internationally. But the pride seems reserved, while often there is little or no pride; only antagonism. It is a pity. These are businesses which haven't got where they are by luck. They are pretty damn good at what they do, and when puerile remarks are made along the lines of the "Mallorcans don't know what they're doing" (in terms of tourism), then perhaps those who make such remarks should spend a bit of time studying the histories of the leading hotel chains.
All this overseas activity casts the hoteliers in a type of ambassadorial role. Meliá's Gabriel Escarrer, for one, believes that the hotel chain's presence in some forty countries helps to enhance Spain's brand internationally. Consequently, global growth over some three decades has led to a reciprocal benefit for Spain in drawing visitors attracted by values of service, culture and lifestyle inherent to the Meliá brand.
But then, perhaps this is, for some Mallorcans, a different problem. Globalisation has assisted the Spanish brand, not that of Mallorca. The hoteliers are thus cast in a different role, that of being "españolistas" and not "nationalistas" (Mallorcan ones, that is).
Maybe the lack of love boils down to a simple dislike of big business - and the hoteliers are Mallorca's big business - and to a more fundamentalist disapproval of the changes that have been wrought by tourism business. Or perhaps it's simpler still. Plain jealousy. There are a few seriously wealthy families in Mallorca, and it doesn't take much to figure out which ones they are.
Quite clearly the hoteliers are investing in Mallorca. Meliá we know all about, but of others? Well, Iberostar has been spending a pretty centimo or two in Cala Millor and Playa de Palma, where Riu is likewise engaged in putting up investment cash. There are plenty of other examples. But for any one or two investments on the island, greater investment activity abroad can be pointed to. To take Riu as an example, between 2014 and 2016 it will have invested in, had built or acquired hotels in Aruba, Mauritius, Morocco, Tunisia, Sri Lanka and New York, to say nothing of developments in Bulgaria and Tenerife. Though Riu has decided to abandon Cuba, its large fellow Mallorcan players are quite happy to take a deeper plunge in the scramble for the Castro-lite Cuba, now undergoing a relationship normalisation with the White House.
All of this overseas activity is, therefore, picked up on and used as evidence for the prosecution in damning the large hoteliers for seeking ever greater riches on foreign shores and leaving poor Mallorca to a slow death of comparative lack of quality and investment. How can these companies, these Mallorcans do such a thing?
It's all nonsense of course. Mallorca's "Big Four" (Meliá, Riu, Iberostar, Barceló) and some of the smaller pretenders to this quartet are global businesses. The clue to their interest in foreign investment lies with the adjective. Global businesses don't become global businesses by channelling all their wealth into markets with limited (very limited) scope for growth; and Mallorca offers very limited scope, especially for new developments. They act in accordance with principles of growth that are relevant to any industry: if you have built a strong home market with limited further opportunity, then you look elsewhere, especially when the industry you serve - tourism - is as avaricious for new destinations as it is.
Do Mallorcans (and indeed foreign residents living in Mallorca) love the Big Four and the other large hoteliers? Those who are employed by them or who have businesses that supply them would probably say yes. But as for everyone else?
The people who criticise the apparent neglect of Mallorca in favour of global development are probably among the ones who also harangue the hoteliers for their opposition to the private holiday accommodation sector. The hoteliers are, therefore, damned whatever they do. Invest much more heavily in Mallorca, and they'll get slammed for their attempts to further dominate the island's accommodation market and for being the sole beneficiaries of Delgado-Martínez Law, i.e. the 2012 tourism bill. Plough millions upon millions into some desert island, and they are branded traitors on account of their imperialist ambitions at the expense of little old Mallorca. And, to compound the apparent felony of imperialism, it is these very hotel groups which have exported know-how that has enabled other destinations to grow. Treachery.
The Big Four and others should be businesses of which Mallorcans can be proud. They are Mallorca internationally. But the pride seems reserved, while often there is little or no pride; only antagonism. It is a pity. These are businesses which haven't got where they are by luck. They are pretty damn good at what they do, and when puerile remarks are made along the lines of the "Mallorcans don't know what they're doing" (in terms of tourism), then perhaps those who make such remarks should spend a bit of time studying the histories of the leading hotel chains.
All this overseas activity casts the hoteliers in a type of ambassadorial role. Meliá's Gabriel Escarrer, for one, believes that the hotel chain's presence in some forty countries helps to enhance Spain's brand internationally. Consequently, global growth over some three decades has led to a reciprocal benefit for Spain in drawing visitors attracted by values of service, culture and lifestyle inherent to the Meliá brand.
But then, perhaps this is, for some Mallorcans, a different problem. Globalisation has assisted the Spanish brand, not that of Mallorca. The hoteliers are thus cast in a different role, that of being "españolistas" and not "nationalistas" (Mallorcan ones, that is).
Maybe the lack of love boils down to a simple dislike of big business - and the hoteliers are Mallorca's big business - and to a more fundamentalist disapproval of the changes that have been wrought by tourism business. Or perhaps it's simpler still. Plain jealousy. There are a few seriously wealthy families in Mallorca, and it doesn't take much to figure out which ones they are.
Friday, November 28, 2014
Isabel In Quality Land
Isabel Borrego, the Mallorcan who is the national secretary-of-state for tourism, has been suspiciously visible over the past few days. After three years of relative anonymity or of, when becoming visible, a tendency to put her foot in it, she has suddenly taken tourism centre-stage. Something's afoot, or perhaps she's just taking the heat off her boss, Soria, as the flak flies in the Canaries over oil prospecting and is about to fly in the Balearics for the same reason. Whatever the reason for this unexpected activity, Isabel has followed up her grand idea for Shopping Tourism 2015 with the Strategic Plan for Quality, something which has in mind giving Spain the most advanced tourism quality system in the world.
As ever with announcements of such plans, there were precious few details to explain what she meant, other than vague references to perfecting cultures of hospitality and attention to tourists and to attracting tourists with increased purchasing power (the same principle underpins her shopping plan). Asian tourists would appear to be important to all this. Their number has risen by 20% so far this year, and as they spend more than other tourists, Isabel is clearly keen to cash in. Not that Asian tourists are going to mean a great deal for Mallorca at present, save for a few Chinese knocking around on golf courses. Without direct flights, getting a piece of the Asian action will be hard.
Meanwhile, Isabel didn't have good news for hoteliers who have been imploring national government to give them some form of fiscal preference, as in reducing IVA. She didn't believe that this was likely, noting that sectors of the tourism industry (not all but certainly the hotels) do already have preferential treatment in that IVA is charged at a lower rate of 10%.
She has also been speaking about holiday lets, and what she had to say was very little. This is a matter for regional governments, she pointed out, which is something we already knew, the national government having abrogated responsibility (for fear of upsetting the hoteliers) and dressed this up as decentralisation of decision-making, something which has led to the lack of harmony of regulations across Spain.
Figures issued by the Balearics Statistics Institute for October's tourism should be noted by Isabel, by Martínez and by the Mallorcan hoteliers. Though healthy - over one million tourists, which is in fact very healthy for October - the figures point to the importance of non-hotel accommodation in attracting tourists. It can be misleading to refer to a lengthening of the season in respect of October, given that October is part of the summer season, but a lengthening was how these figures were being interpreted in some quarters. The fact that holiday lets were playing a significant role in this lengthening contradicts the frankly stupid comments that have come from Martínez and the hoteliers' federation. They have claimed that holiday lets only intensify seasonality, when it should be obvious that they can play a role in making it less intense and so lengthening the season even further. (When there are so few hotels open, this should be clear.)
As ever with announcements of such plans, there were precious few details to explain what she meant, other than vague references to perfecting cultures of hospitality and attention to tourists and to attracting tourists with increased purchasing power (the same principle underpins her shopping plan). Asian tourists would appear to be important to all this. Their number has risen by 20% so far this year, and as they spend more than other tourists, Isabel is clearly keen to cash in. Not that Asian tourists are going to mean a great deal for Mallorca at present, save for a few Chinese knocking around on golf courses. Without direct flights, getting a piece of the Asian action will be hard.
Meanwhile, Isabel didn't have good news for hoteliers who have been imploring national government to give them some form of fiscal preference, as in reducing IVA. She didn't believe that this was likely, noting that sectors of the tourism industry (not all but certainly the hotels) do already have preferential treatment in that IVA is charged at a lower rate of 10%.
She has also been speaking about holiday lets, and what she had to say was very little. This is a matter for regional governments, she pointed out, which is something we already knew, the national government having abrogated responsibility (for fear of upsetting the hoteliers) and dressed this up as decentralisation of decision-making, something which has led to the lack of harmony of regulations across Spain.
Figures issued by the Balearics Statistics Institute for October's tourism should be noted by Isabel, by Martínez and by the Mallorcan hoteliers. Though healthy - over one million tourists, which is in fact very healthy for October - the figures point to the importance of non-hotel accommodation in attracting tourists. It can be misleading to refer to a lengthening of the season in respect of October, given that October is part of the summer season, but a lengthening was how these figures were being interpreted in some quarters. The fact that holiday lets were playing a significant role in this lengthening contradicts the frankly stupid comments that have come from Martínez and the hoteliers' federation. They have claimed that holiday lets only intensify seasonality, when it should be obvious that they can play a role in making it less intense and so lengthening the season even further. (When there are so few hotels open, this should be clear.)
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Need Not Cost: Balearics' parliamentary deputies
If a legal reform is drafted, under which the number of deputies to parliament are reduced by 16, who do you suppose would be most prominent in offering a reaction to such a draft? If you reckon that it would be spokespeople from various political parties, then you would be right. But you might not reckon on it being a spokesperson from one sector of the business community.
President Bauzá has put forward the draft to reduce the size of the Balearic parliament from 59 to 43 deputies. When this reduction was first being discussed in September last year, the cut was to have been 18 deputies. Two have, therefore, been spared. 16 from 59, or some 27%, might seem like a lot of deputies to get rid of, but the question is still the same now as it was back in September. Why does the parliament need 43 let alone 59 deputies? A second question also remains. How do they arrive at these numbers in the first place?
The answer to this second question has been offered by Paul Heywood, a professor of European politics. He has said that parliamentary representation in Spain and not just the Balearics is determined "without any guiding orientation". The number of deputies, therefore, are pretty much plucked out of the air. There is a bit more to it than that because there is a territorial-population relationship, but the guiding orientation is, nevertheless, somewhat woolly and indeed open to interpretation. What guiding orientation there is suggests - in general terms - that there should be one representative per 40,000 people. For the Balearics, there is currently one deputy for 19,000 people. Under the reform this would rise to 26,000 people, while the number of seats in parliament would become 24 for Mallorca (nine fewer), nine for both Menorca and Ibiza (respectively, down four and three), and one for Formentera (no change).
The government's justification for the reform is a cost one. It claims that the reduction would result in a saving of slightly more than eleven million euros during the period of a legislature. As such, the motivation for the reform is very much in line with government policy to cut the costs of public administration. But this cost saving is being seen as a smokescreen and as a diversion of attention from other matters. It is also being seen as a ploy to ensure that the Partido Popular always wins elections.
Electoral reform has a tendency to benefit governments which introduce it. Or at least this is how such reform is typically perceived and is certainly how it is being perceived in the Balearics by the other parties and by some analysts. The smaller parties stand to lose out under this reform. Democracy and true representation of the people are, therefore, undermined.
The chances of the draft reform actually becoming law are not as might be presumed. For a reform of this nature, having a parliamentary majority, which the PP has, is insufficient. A two-thirds vote in favour is required. The PP does not have enough deputies to carry this vote. As it is believed that smaller parties will suffer under the reform, it seems unlikely that they would back the government. PSOE, the main opposition, certainly won't be supporting Bauzá.
While it is easy for the opposition parties to toss around accusations of being undemocratic, they are not answering the question why the number is as it is. Or indeed as it would become. There are parts of Spain where the ratio of people to deputy is considerably higher than the 40,000 benchmark. In Andalusia, as an example, the ratio is one per 75,000.
The PP is playing to its audience by challenging the opposition to justify not diverting the 11 million from parliamentary cost to other causes, such as the health service, but in a way it doesn't need to. Does the electorate believe that it is necessary for there to be 59 deputies? Maybe it does believe so, but there is no truly convincing argument as to why.
Opposition parties being as opposition parties are, one would expect them to oppose the reform, but what of the support for the government? Who is the spokesperson from a sector of the business community who has voiced support? It is the president of the Mallorcan hoteliers federation. And what, pray, has this reform got to do with the hoteliers?
The federation's president, Aurelio Vázquez, says that the reduction would be in line with the hoteliers calls for rationalisation of public expenditure and that other political parties should support the government. The federation has every right to express its views, but is it really appropriate for it to be getting involved? There is a suspicion that it gets its way with PP legislation as it is, and by voicing support, it will only make opposition parties less inclined to back the government.
The reform seems reasonable enough, but a key justification is in danger of being lost in the argument. Need, and not cost or what the hoteliers might think. Why are so many deputies needed? They aren't.
Index for April 2014
Alcúdia's Mile - 4 April 2014
Alcúdia's port - 25 April 2014
All-inclusives and PSOE policy - 28 April 2014
Article salat at IB3 - 17 April 2014, 29 April 2014
Balearic parliamentary deputies reduction - 30 April 2014
Bullfighting - 22 April 2014
Fairs in April - 5 April 2014
Calvia and Sóller on Trip Advisor - 10 April 2014
Camping in Mallorca - 15 April 2014
Corruption and residence cards - 3 April 2014
Cricket season, Mallorcan tourism season - 7 April 2014
Feuds - 18 April 2014
Francina Armengol wins PSOE presidential nomination - 8 April 2014
Gabriel García Márquez and Day of the Book - 20 April 2014
Insecurities in Mallorca - 1 April 2014
Low-cost hotels - 16 April 2014
Mallorca's plain and tourism - 6 April 2014
May hotel occupancy in Mallorca - 24 April 2014
Mayors rebel against President Bauzá - 12 April 2014
Nicknames - 23 April 2014
Palm Sunday - 13 April 2014
Pancaritat Easter picnics - 19 April 2014
Partido Popular and discounts - 26 April 2014
Playa de Muro's boulevard - 11 April 2014
Summer season in Mallorca - 27 April 2014
Ten things that changed Mallorca's tourism - 14 April 2014
Theme parks - 2 April 2014
Tourism museum in Calella - 9 April 2014
Tourism raw material - 21 April 2014
President Bauzá has put forward the draft to reduce the size of the Balearic parliament from 59 to 43 deputies. When this reduction was first being discussed in September last year, the cut was to have been 18 deputies. Two have, therefore, been spared. 16 from 59, or some 27%, might seem like a lot of deputies to get rid of, but the question is still the same now as it was back in September. Why does the parliament need 43 let alone 59 deputies? A second question also remains. How do they arrive at these numbers in the first place?
The answer to this second question has been offered by Paul Heywood, a professor of European politics. He has said that parliamentary representation in Spain and not just the Balearics is determined "without any guiding orientation". The number of deputies, therefore, are pretty much plucked out of the air. There is a bit more to it than that because there is a territorial-population relationship, but the guiding orientation is, nevertheless, somewhat woolly and indeed open to interpretation. What guiding orientation there is suggests - in general terms - that there should be one representative per 40,000 people. For the Balearics, there is currently one deputy for 19,000 people. Under the reform this would rise to 26,000 people, while the number of seats in parliament would become 24 for Mallorca (nine fewer), nine for both Menorca and Ibiza (respectively, down four and three), and one for Formentera (no change).
The government's justification for the reform is a cost one. It claims that the reduction would result in a saving of slightly more than eleven million euros during the period of a legislature. As such, the motivation for the reform is very much in line with government policy to cut the costs of public administration. But this cost saving is being seen as a smokescreen and as a diversion of attention from other matters. It is also being seen as a ploy to ensure that the Partido Popular always wins elections.
Electoral reform has a tendency to benefit governments which introduce it. Or at least this is how such reform is typically perceived and is certainly how it is being perceived in the Balearics by the other parties and by some analysts. The smaller parties stand to lose out under this reform. Democracy and true representation of the people are, therefore, undermined.
The chances of the draft reform actually becoming law are not as might be presumed. For a reform of this nature, having a parliamentary majority, which the PP has, is insufficient. A two-thirds vote in favour is required. The PP does not have enough deputies to carry this vote. As it is believed that smaller parties will suffer under the reform, it seems unlikely that they would back the government. PSOE, the main opposition, certainly won't be supporting Bauzá.
While it is easy for the opposition parties to toss around accusations of being undemocratic, they are not answering the question why the number is as it is. Or indeed as it would become. There are parts of Spain where the ratio of people to deputy is considerably higher than the 40,000 benchmark. In Andalusia, as an example, the ratio is one per 75,000.
The PP is playing to its audience by challenging the opposition to justify not diverting the 11 million from parliamentary cost to other causes, such as the health service, but in a way it doesn't need to. Does the electorate believe that it is necessary for there to be 59 deputies? Maybe it does believe so, but there is no truly convincing argument as to why.
Opposition parties being as opposition parties are, one would expect them to oppose the reform, but what of the support for the government? Who is the spokesperson from a sector of the business community who has voiced support? It is the president of the Mallorcan hoteliers federation. And what, pray, has this reform got to do with the hoteliers?
The federation's president, Aurelio Vázquez, says that the reduction would be in line with the hoteliers calls for rationalisation of public expenditure and that other political parties should support the government. The federation has every right to express its views, but is it really appropriate for it to be getting involved? There is a suspicion that it gets its way with PP legislation as it is, and by voicing support, it will only make opposition parties less inclined to back the government.
The reform seems reasonable enough, but a key justification is in danger of being lost in the argument. Need, and not cost or what the hoteliers might think. Why are so many deputies needed? They aren't.
Index for April 2014
Alcúdia's Mile - 4 April 2014
Alcúdia's port - 25 April 2014
All-inclusives and PSOE policy - 28 April 2014
Article salat at IB3 - 17 April 2014, 29 April 2014
Balearic parliamentary deputies reduction - 30 April 2014
Bullfighting - 22 April 2014
Fairs in April - 5 April 2014
Calvia and Sóller on Trip Advisor - 10 April 2014
Camping in Mallorca - 15 April 2014
Corruption and residence cards - 3 April 2014
Cricket season, Mallorcan tourism season - 7 April 2014
Feuds - 18 April 2014
Francina Armengol wins PSOE presidential nomination - 8 April 2014
Gabriel García Márquez and Day of the Book - 20 April 2014
Insecurities in Mallorca - 1 April 2014
Low-cost hotels - 16 April 2014
Mallorca's plain and tourism - 6 April 2014
May hotel occupancy in Mallorca - 24 April 2014
Mayors rebel against President Bauzá - 12 April 2014
Nicknames - 23 April 2014
Palm Sunday - 13 April 2014
Pancaritat Easter picnics - 19 April 2014
Partido Popular and discounts - 26 April 2014
Playa de Muro's boulevard - 11 April 2014
Summer season in Mallorca - 27 April 2014
Ten things that changed Mallorca's tourism - 14 April 2014
Theme parks - 2 April 2014
Tourism museum in Calella - 9 April 2014
Tourism raw material - 21 April 2014
Monday, April 21, 2014
Tourists Are Just Raw Material
Joserra and the faithful architect Martínez went walkabout in Calas Millor and Ratjada last week. President Bauzá, having recently attempted (and largely failed) to charm a discontented Partido Popular part forana in Campos, has now attempted to show that he is a man of the people - the tourism people. Whoever they might be.
This is not an idle question. President and tourism minister deigned to leave their southern cloisters and venture into the neverlands of the east coast of the island (neverlands because they never normally go there) and to see tourism in the raw - as raw as it can be in the pre-season and, in the case of Cala Ratjada, without the lebensrauming youth movement of summer in full lager mode. Of course, they saw no such rawness. They met hoteliers, they met mayors, they admired the new sports centre in Cala Millor, they contemplated the mural in Cala Ratjada's port, they uttered the typical bland statements about tackling seasonality and increasing the quality of tourism, and they strolled along the prom-prom-proms, tiddly-on-pom-pom.
They would have seen something of this thing called tourism, but they would have heard only from hoteliers and local politicians. They wouldn't have heard from those tourism people - tourists themselves. One doesn't necessarily expect Bauzá to be slumming it some bar with a bunch of drunks, listening to moans about the rising price of cigarettes, but is it too much to expect that he, and indeed other politicians, might actually attempt to engage with tourists once in a while?
Tourism is a curious industry. Its raw material is not hotel buildings, not airports, not bars or restaurants. It is people. Without people, there is no tourism. But consider how this human resource, with its attendant feelings, needs and wishes, is treated. It is as if it were mere raw material. Its movement from airport to hotel to room, its supply of food and drink, its processing at airport or reception can be depersonalised as a production line and characterised as a diagram of ASME symbols to denote specific steps along the line.
Much as it might try and convince otherwise, the tourism industry abhors infinite variety and customisation and applies the marketing spin of satisfying customer demand while simultaneously packaging it in ways which are determined by its supply-side process management. Packaging. Never has a term been more apt. The holiday package. The tourism of pre-determination that eliminates as much non-standardisation as possible with the objective of minimising cost and maximising profit. Tourism may not adhere to Henry Ford's customer focus of any car you want so long as it is black, but the principle of the standardised production line isn't so far removed from the general ethos of the tourism industry.
Mass tourism was a Fordist system of human processing. It still is, though to be fair, the industry has gone some way in correcting the standardised model. But it can't rid itself of the model entirely. Of course it can't. There are very good managerial reasons why not. But tourism in its human form and in a Mallorcan style is remote. It is divorced from those who legislate and from those who create the palaces by the sea.
The essential nature of Mallorca's tourism should mean a far closer relationship. But there are so many layers between the raw material - the people who matter - and the decision-makers. Where politicians are concerned, those at government level hear from island councils, who hear from mayors, who hear from their own councillors, who hear from ...? Well, I don't know who exactly. And into all of this are added the voices of the tourism powerful - not tourists themselves - but the manufacturers, namely the airlines, the tour operators and, most significantly in a Mallorcan context, the hoteliers.
A consequence of this process management of tourism is that it gives birth to political processors as opposed to those who, it might be said, operate more by instinct or by understanding or by being told what to think by the tourism powerful. Martínez, the faithful architect, is a tourism technocrat. Go and look at his CV on the regional government's website. His is a background in urban planning. As I mention above, buildings are not tourism raw material; people are.
But buildings are more important and they are easier to deal with, too. They don't talk, they don't have needs or wishes. It is utterly depressing that Martínez can, as he has, trot out the technocratic apologetics for dismissing out of hand proposals regarding holiday lets. You would expect him to, though, as he is representative not just of a government which refuses to consider less standardisation of the tourism model but also of an industry which disregards what the raw material of the tourism people have to say, or might say if they were ever spoken to.
This is not an idle question. President and tourism minister deigned to leave their southern cloisters and venture into the neverlands of the east coast of the island (neverlands because they never normally go there) and to see tourism in the raw - as raw as it can be in the pre-season and, in the case of Cala Ratjada, without the lebensrauming youth movement of summer in full lager mode. Of course, they saw no such rawness. They met hoteliers, they met mayors, they admired the new sports centre in Cala Millor, they contemplated the mural in Cala Ratjada's port, they uttered the typical bland statements about tackling seasonality and increasing the quality of tourism, and they strolled along the prom-prom-proms, tiddly-on-pom-pom.
They would have seen something of this thing called tourism, but they would have heard only from hoteliers and local politicians. They wouldn't have heard from those tourism people - tourists themselves. One doesn't necessarily expect Bauzá to be slumming it some bar with a bunch of drunks, listening to moans about the rising price of cigarettes, but is it too much to expect that he, and indeed other politicians, might actually attempt to engage with tourists once in a while?
Tourism is a curious industry. Its raw material is not hotel buildings, not airports, not bars or restaurants. It is people. Without people, there is no tourism. But consider how this human resource, with its attendant feelings, needs and wishes, is treated. It is as if it were mere raw material. Its movement from airport to hotel to room, its supply of food and drink, its processing at airport or reception can be depersonalised as a production line and characterised as a diagram of ASME symbols to denote specific steps along the line.
Much as it might try and convince otherwise, the tourism industry abhors infinite variety and customisation and applies the marketing spin of satisfying customer demand while simultaneously packaging it in ways which are determined by its supply-side process management. Packaging. Never has a term been more apt. The holiday package. The tourism of pre-determination that eliminates as much non-standardisation as possible with the objective of minimising cost and maximising profit. Tourism may not adhere to Henry Ford's customer focus of any car you want so long as it is black, but the principle of the standardised production line isn't so far removed from the general ethos of the tourism industry.
Mass tourism was a Fordist system of human processing. It still is, though to be fair, the industry has gone some way in correcting the standardised model. But it can't rid itself of the model entirely. Of course it can't. There are very good managerial reasons why not. But tourism in its human form and in a Mallorcan style is remote. It is divorced from those who legislate and from those who create the palaces by the sea.
The essential nature of Mallorca's tourism should mean a far closer relationship. But there are so many layers between the raw material - the people who matter - and the decision-makers. Where politicians are concerned, those at government level hear from island councils, who hear from mayors, who hear from their own councillors, who hear from ...? Well, I don't know who exactly. And into all of this are added the voices of the tourism powerful - not tourists themselves - but the manufacturers, namely the airlines, the tour operators and, most significantly in a Mallorcan context, the hoteliers.
A consequence of this process management of tourism is that it gives birth to political processors as opposed to those who, it might be said, operate more by instinct or by understanding or by being told what to think by the tourism powerful. Martínez, the faithful architect, is a tourism technocrat. Go and look at his CV on the regional government's website. His is a background in urban planning. As I mention above, buildings are not tourism raw material; people are.
But buildings are more important and they are easier to deal with, too. They don't talk, they don't have needs or wishes. It is utterly depressing that Martínez can, as he has, trot out the technocratic apologetics for dismissing out of hand proposals regarding holiday lets. You would expect him to, though, as he is representative not just of a government which refuses to consider less standardisation of the tourism model but also of an industry which disregards what the raw material of the tourism people have to say, or might say if they were ever spoken to.
Friday, December 27, 2013
Who Shouts The Loudest: Balearics tourism industry
In October there was a significant development in the way that tourist businesses are organised. Different associations representing the non-hotel sector finally agreed to create a single body. These associations include those for restaurants, nightclubs, attractions, travel agencies, car rental and others.
The reasoning behind one body was obvious. It was to create a single voice to deal with the Balearic Government that could act as a counterbalance to the very strong and dominant single voice of the hoteliers. Though it has been said that the forming of this body was prompted by concerns about the increase in IVA by the national government, there were matters of local concern that were just as important. Many of them stemmed from the tourism law of 2012 and from the way in which the tourism market functions. All-inclusives, holiday rentals, hotels' secondary activities; these are just some of the issues which unite the non-hotel, complementary sector.
There not having been one body until now is a mystery. When one part of the tourism industry dominates as it does in the Balearics and has the ear of the government as closely as it does, then surely there should have been an alternative voice for the rest of the industry for years. One can attribute the absence of such a body to different reasons but perhaps the main one is that, because there are that many associations, finding common purpose among them all has been nigh on impossible.
The penny should have dropped a long time ago, though. The hoteliers have been in the ascendant for as long as there has been mass tourism. Obviously they have. Without them, there would have been no mass tourism and so wouldn't have been all the complementary elements. The hoteliers get a bad press, but it shouldn't be forgotten who it was who created mass tourism; it wasn't attractions or even restaurants.
This, though, interprets tourism in an imbalanced way. Something had to come first to get Mallorca to where it is, and the hotels were this something, but the complementary sector was equally as important. The tourism industry comprises many parts, all feeding off each other, complementing each other. But the very term complementary offer implies a secondary function; it complements the hotel sector. Without the hotels, there would be nothing to complement.
Nevertheless, for years this complementary status functioned well enough. Hotels did what hotels did. Restaurants and bars did what they did. But then, and one can place the point in time to be in the early to mid-1990s, the relationship began to change. Some twenty years on, the complementary sector only has itself to blame for what it did precious little to challenge: the arrival of the all-inclusive.
Complacency was undoubtedly a factor. All-inclusive was still only small scale. It would probably go away. It didn't. Organisation was another, and only now has it really come home to the complementary sector that its own organisation was flawed. There was the Balearics Confederation of Business Associations (CAEB) to represent it. But it also represented the hoteliers. Twenty years since becoming president of CAEB, Josep Oliver has stepped down. Business associations are reluctant to even nominate a successor. They have serious issues with CAEB because it has seemed pro-hotelier. They consider it to be useless.
If it is, then these business associations have surely allowed it to be. It is staggering that it has taken them so long to grasp the nettle and to attempt to place their interests at the top of the tourism industry agenda and not those of the hoteliers. It is staggering just how weak the pronouncements from some of these associations now sound. They can speak about the impact of all-inclusives as though these have only just been recognised. This impact may have been less obvious in the 1990s but by the turn of the century it had become obvious. Why weren't they raising merry hell about holiday rentals when the tourism law of 1999 was passed and not waiting until this year, and the reform of the national law on lettings, to begin to object strongly? The situation is fundamentally no different to what it was at the end of the last millennium.
Better late than never, one supposes, but what will this unified body achieve? One of the myriad associations on the island is Acotur, that which represents tourist businesses. In its most recent magazine it attacks the government for being too much on the side of the hoteliers and for reneging on an electoral promise to help the non-hotel sector. But then Acotur is just one voice among many. A unified body may achieve what it, Acotur, has wanted, but it will only do so if the government is confronted with a body with an assertive agenda. One recalls how the government buckled when the large retailers took it on over the green taxes. If business shouts loud enough, then the government will listen. Until now, though, it has been the hoteliers who have been doing the shouting. And with one voice.
The reasoning behind one body was obvious. It was to create a single voice to deal with the Balearic Government that could act as a counterbalance to the very strong and dominant single voice of the hoteliers. Though it has been said that the forming of this body was prompted by concerns about the increase in IVA by the national government, there were matters of local concern that were just as important. Many of them stemmed from the tourism law of 2012 and from the way in which the tourism market functions. All-inclusives, holiday rentals, hotels' secondary activities; these are just some of the issues which unite the non-hotel, complementary sector.
There not having been one body until now is a mystery. When one part of the tourism industry dominates as it does in the Balearics and has the ear of the government as closely as it does, then surely there should have been an alternative voice for the rest of the industry for years. One can attribute the absence of such a body to different reasons but perhaps the main one is that, because there are that many associations, finding common purpose among them all has been nigh on impossible.
The penny should have dropped a long time ago, though. The hoteliers have been in the ascendant for as long as there has been mass tourism. Obviously they have. Without them, there would have been no mass tourism and so wouldn't have been all the complementary elements. The hoteliers get a bad press, but it shouldn't be forgotten who it was who created mass tourism; it wasn't attractions or even restaurants.
This, though, interprets tourism in an imbalanced way. Something had to come first to get Mallorca to where it is, and the hotels were this something, but the complementary sector was equally as important. The tourism industry comprises many parts, all feeding off each other, complementing each other. But the very term complementary offer implies a secondary function; it complements the hotel sector. Without the hotels, there would be nothing to complement.
Nevertheless, for years this complementary status functioned well enough. Hotels did what hotels did. Restaurants and bars did what they did. But then, and one can place the point in time to be in the early to mid-1990s, the relationship began to change. Some twenty years on, the complementary sector only has itself to blame for what it did precious little to challenge: the arrival of the all-inclusive.
Complacency was undoubtedly a factor. All-inclusive was still only small scale. It would probably go away. It didn't. Organisation was another, and only now has it really come home to the complementary sector that its own organisation was flawed. There was the Balearics Confederation of Business Associations (CAEB) to represent it. But it also represented the hoteliers. Twenty years since becoming president of CAEB, Josep Oliver has stepped down. Business associations are reluctant to even nominate a successor. They have serious issues with CAEB because it has seemed pro-hotelier. They consider it to be useless.
If it is, then these business associations have surely allowed it to be. It is staggering that it has taken them so long to grasp the nettle and to attempt to place their interests at the top of the tourism industry agenda and not those of the hoteliers. It is staggering just how weak the pronouncements from some of these associations now sound. They can speak about the impact of all-inclusives as though these have only just been recognised. This impact may have been less obvious in the 1990s but by the turn of the century it had become obvious. Why weren't they raising merry hell about holiday rentals when the tourism law of 1999 was passed and not waiting until this year, and the reform of the national law on lettings, to begin to object strongly? The situation is fundamentally no different to what it was at the end of the last millennium.
Better late than never, one supposes, but what will this unified body achieve? One of the myriad associations on the island is Acotur, that which represents tourist businesses. In its most recent magazine it attacks the government for being too much on the side of the hoteliers and for reneging on an electoral promise to help the non-hotel sector. But then Acotur is just one voice among many. A unified body may achieve what it, Acotur, has wanted, but it will only do so if the government is confronted with a body with an assertive agenda. One recalls how the government buckled when the large retailers took it on over the green taxes. If business shouts loud enough, then the government will listen. Until now, though, it has been the hoteliers who have been doing the shouting. And with one voice.
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
MALLORCA TODAY - Alcúdia hoteliers attack high water rates
Hoteliers in Alcúdia are to take legal action over what they say are excessively high water rates - charges having risen by 35% in the last two years. Their complaints about these rates are not new, as they were raised back in 2009 when justification was sought for the charges but no justification given.
See more: Diario de Mallorca
See more: Diario de Mallorca
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