Let's Spend Lots Of Money (Me Too)

300 million euros, over 650 different buildings and facilities for sporting, cultural and administrative purposes. These are the bare facts of what the Council of Mallorca and town halls have been spending money on over the past 15 years. In itself, the spend might seem reasonable enough, if it has all been a case of creating necessary infrastructure, but more often than not, this has not been the case. It has been spend predicated on a me-too mentality, spread across municipalities whose sizes rarely justify the spend. It has been spend that hasn't always been spent, as suppliers have not been paid, and spend that has demanded ever more spend, in the form of maintenance; a spend that cannot be made because there isn't the money for it.

Revelations as to the startling levels of expenditure by local authorities in Mallorca have slowly been filtering out. First we learned, two years ago, that personnel costs at town halls had doubled in the space of ten years. Then we learned, last month, that a quarter of total town hall spend is devoted to "competences" that are beyond those which town halls are obliged to spend money on. Now we have the latest facts - the 300 million euros on public swimming-pools, cultural centres, football pitches, buildings for administration and so on and so on.

The swimming-pools are an interesting one. In the north of Mallorca, Sa Pobla leaks a deficit of 150,000 euros a year for maintaining what was the first indoor pool in the area. This pool was followed by the construction of pools in Santa Margalida, Alcúdia and Puerto Pollensa; four pools for a total combined population of under 60,000. Maybe this is the right ratio, I really couldn't say, but what I can say is that each pool has been a disaster. Santa Margalida's faces demolition because its leak simply cannot be rectified. Alcúdia's and Puerto Pollensa's have both been beset with problems related to the contractors operating the pools. They all lose money.

The pools have been symptomatic of an absence of planning as to how to run the facilities once they were built and of the presence of an attitude which demands that because one town has something, so must its neighbour. On an island with so many small towns, it has led to a wholly unnecessary proliferation of all manner of facilities and had it not been for economic crisis, there would be more being developed.

A fine example of this me-too mentality was Pollensa's desire for an auditorium. It would have required an investment in the region of ten or eleven million euros. The town hall finally saw sense earlier this year and scrapped the project, one that was always flawed, as there already was an auditorium in Alcúdia, one that has never operated at anything like full capacity since it was built at the end of the last century.

There are other examples. Take the industrial estate in Alcúdia. Blocked off to prevent vehicle access and so hopefully stop more copper cabling being nicked, its layout was finished three years ago. There is still not a single unit on it, the reason for which, supposedly, is an inability to arrive at an agreement over electricity supply. If this really is the reason, why was something so fundamental not sorted out much earlier on? One fancies there are other reasons, and one only has to look at the empty spaces on industrial estates in neighbouring towns to know what they might be.

Less extravagant are the day-to-day expenditures for facilities like kindergartens and day centres, yet these expenditures cannot be met, mainly because the regional government doesn't give sufficient funding. But in a way, this sums up the whole issue of how infrastructure and facilities came into being. Town halls expected the flow of cash from regional government to continue, the regional government expected the flow of cash from national government to continue, and national government was probably still under the impression that Brussels would be handing over blank cheques.

There is much to be said for towns and villages all having different types of facility, as they add to a sense of community and of identity, but - and this raises once more questions as to the viability of the continuing existence of town halls in their current state - this has come at a high price, one paid for through a system of local government that was allowed to grow like topsy without sufficient or any thought being given to where this system was leading. We now know where it has led.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.

Attractions Want Lower Attraction?

Did you know there was such a thing as an association for Mallorcan tourist attractions? As there is an association for pretty much everything else, it should come as no surprise that attractions should have one. But unlike the attractions themselves, which attract no end of attention, the association barely seems to register in the tourist scheme of things. Yet it should have an altogether stronger presence, because its membership comprises the best-known names in Mallorca. Best-known names, bar none, including hotels.

What reminded me of an association I and probably everyone else had completely forgotten about was a report of a speech by the association's new president. The director-general of the Palma Aquarium, Antonio González, was talking about the "error" that is the all-inclusive.

Here we go again, you might think. And here we do indeed go again. Sr. González argues that the all-inclusive offer represents an attempt to compete on price with other destinations (which is hard to do and even harder to sustain) and also a long-term danger that threatens the "quality of supply" in Mallorca.

Well, it's difficult to disagree, especially if you've been saying much the same thing for God knows how many years. And this is precisely the problem with all the discourse surrounding all-inclusives; it has been said time and time again, and the debate never moves on and no one seems to listen. No one who matters, that is.

Actually, this isn't totally accurate. There are those who listen, as they are made to. Meliá, for example, had to listen to questions regarding its re-development in Magalluf the other day. Was it going to entail more all-inclusive, the company was asked. Oh no, came the answer. Meliá has in mind a new profile of tourist with high purchasing power, one on 250 euros a night. Really?

Let's hope there isn't any backtracking. All-inclusive isn't solely about competing on price. There can be costly all-inclusive, just as there can be the economy class. You could get some pretty exclusive all-inclusive for 250 euros a night, especially if the regional government has allowed you - you being a hotel, that is - to fill the hotel grounds with much of what is currently only available outside these hotel grounds, including that offered by the odd member of the attractions' association.

What eventually transpires in Magalluf could, one stresses could, just serve as a model for the rest of the island's resorts. If so, the attractions' association would be extremely happy, as would be many others. Or would they? What sort of volume of tourist numbers will be passing through Palma airport in future if they are all expected to part with 250 euros a night? The question is an important one, because much of the island's tourism industry relies on high volume, as does that industry which is offshore, namely the tour operators and most airlines. And this volume demands all-inclusive, and inexpensive all-inclusive, to boot.

The seemingly intractable problem of quantity versus quality (and in overall tourism terms, you can't have both) and its associated problem of the all-inclusive is not likely to be resolved swiftly by what Meliá is planning. Nor is the other intractable problem of seasonality, a theme to which Sr. González also turned his attention. Six to seven months tourism and it's hard for any business, let alone an attraction, to be able to invest for a future or justify investing in a future that might or might not eventually bring in the 250-euro-a-night tourist.

This said, the Aquarium is an example of significant investment. It is also an example of all-year business, as indeed are some other attractions that are members of the association. As with all-inclusives, Sr. González has not offered a solution to the lack of off-season tourism, but it is good that the attractions' association seems to want to make its voice heard. These attractions attract between them 5.5 million visitors a year. They are hugely important players which should be taking a more assertive and central role in influencing general tourism strategy than, as a lack of media coverage would suggest, they have.

Though the attractions, like other businesses, depend on volume, the future may require a lower volume of tourism. No, not may, does require. Sr. González has added that the number of tourists is less important than tourist spend potential. And if a lower number means fewer economy-class all-inclusives, then so be it. Whether such a solution would, however, be palatable to everyone, such as the tour operators, is another matter. But then the attractions know all about the tour operators.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.