The Hotel Federation of Mallorca has expressed its disappointment at the “lack of courage” of the current Balearic Government after attending the two days of debate on the state of the community held in the Parliament. Hoteliers criticize the announced increase in the ecotax during the summer months, the fact that no measures have been announced against tourist apartments and the increase in the water fee for large consumers, preferably hotels. “The regulated offer is being attacked” say the hoteliers of Mallorca.
Hoteliers say that the urgent measures announced by President Prohens against tourist congestion “disappoint us for their lack of ambition and for not being more accurate.” They add that “it is evident and manifest that the participants in the Roundtable, the parliamentary groups and society as a whole have perfectly identified the two priority and urgent issues that concentrate the greatest concern in our archipelago: housing and mobility.”
And the hoteliers of Mallorca add: «We know that the housing problem is complex and requires a multi-faceted approach, however, a golden opportunity has been lost to demonstrate determination and agility with a clear commitment to returning the immense pool of housing to the market. homes that, designed for residential use, specifically in multi-family buildings, are dedicated, with a license or not, to an economic activity and that have diverted thousands of apartments from residential to tourist use.
This process, the hoteliers maintain, “has aggravated the housing shortage suffered by citizens, public and private sector workers and young people who aspire to emancipate themselves and, also, making coexistence and rest difficult, as neighborhood groups have long denounced.” .
The Hotel Federation points out that the tourism law relating to the marketing of tourist stays in homes. «This regulation cannot ignore the various problems that the marketing of tourist stays in residential homes can entail, for which some limits and legal formalities are established basically related to the safeguarding of the right to a home free of immissions, urban planning, territorial planning and adequate environment.
«Taking into consideration the large number of new registrations in housing marketed for tourism that has occurred in recent years and, in anticipation of incorporating the marketing of housing subject to the horizontal property regime, it is essential to control this activity from the from an urban, territorial, environmental and tax perspective.
And the statement from the hoteliers continues: «Although they were already aware of what was going to be generated, they persisted in the call effect, raising the flag of the collaborative economy that has led to more than 98,000 vacation rental places in recent years. “His predictions have been fulfilled and multiplied, having reached a limit situation due to inaction, lack of inspection and sanction, and lack of use of technological tools.”
The Hotel Federation affirms that despite all this, it is surprising that the Balearic Government says that the continuity of regulated tourist rental places in multi-family homes will be guaranteed on all the islands, despite the fact that the law cited above clearly states that Homes that offer tourist stays must always be subject to the permissiveness or not of these instruments, without the possibility of renewal being able to generate rights, including the right to compensation.
For hoteliers, it has been a missed opportunity to announce that vacation rentals would only be allowed in isolated single-family homes, as it was originally, thus alleviating part of the pressure regarding the housing emergency.
«To round off this situation of impunity of the illegal offer, which will continue to run rampant, we see how a new penalty appears for visitors who stay in the regulated offer who will see the ITS rate, the ecotax, increased in the central months of the season. We don’t see how they are going to understand, for example, in the next tourist events, that we welcome them to the Islands by charging them even more and without, for the moment, still perceiving the improvements and transparency in the use of the funds that they religiously They pay when they stay in a legal establishment. We share, and it has been stated repeatedly, that the tax must be finalist and agree on the purposes for which it is intended in a participatory and transparent manner.
Finally, we consider the announced increase in the water fee for large consumers (in most cases much more efficient in their consumption and management) and the reduction for domestic consumers to be very unfortunate, when what should be encouraged is the co-responsibility of all users. consumers to be respectful of a scarce resource and advocate for a more rational use, an objective that is not achieved with discriminatory treatment and a reduction that can discourage rational use of it.
