Business over Tapas Nº 547

A digest of this week's Spanish financial, political and social news aimed primarily at Foreign Property Owners:

Prepared by Lenox Napier.  Consultant: José Antonio Sierra

For subscriptions and other information about this site, go to businessovertapas.com

email:  [email protected]

***Now with Facebook Page (Like!)***

Note: Underlined words or phrases are links to the Internet. Right click and press 'Control' on your keyboard to access.

Business over Tapas and its writers are not responsible for unauthorised copying or other improper use of this material.

Subscription and e-mail information in our archives is never released to third parties.

  

Editorial: 

Last week we saw that the National Court had material to show from various police agencies (known under the general heading of ‘la policía patriótica’) that the previous government had spied on fifty-five deputies of the left-wing Podemos group and affiliates – including the party leaders (as were back in 2015 and 2016) Pablo Iglesias, Irene Montero, Joan Baldoví and Yolanda Díaz. The Minister of the Interior from the Rajoy government and Opus Dei supernumerary Jorge Fernández Díaz is already notorious for its actions against its rivals (when not honouring Nuestra Señora María Santísima del Amor – a plaster saint from a Málaga church – with the Medalla de Oro al Mérito Policial back in 2014).

The question must be – have things changed?

Yolanda Díaz on Twitter: ‘The PP has never accepted the rules of democracy. They spied on us massively to prevent changes in Spain. They didn't get it. Such serious news should push us to continue democratizing institutions. The PP must respond to Spanish society’.

Pablo Iglesias says ‘The dirty war has been enormously successful. I had to leave politics while our party, although it remains alive, has far less electoral strength now than it did eight years ago’.

Joan Baldoví (Compromís) thinks that this is: ‘One of the most serious things that has happened in our democracy’.

Juan Carlos Monedero (co-founder of Podemos) claims in a TV interview that: "Worse things have been done to Podemos than were ever done to the Catalán independentistas".

Journalist Javier Durán on Twitter: ‘The PP has used the Ministry of the Interior and the Police to spy on political rivals. - The Guardia Civil has confirmed the party's meddling in several elections, including the last ones in which it came to government’.

From the beginning, it was a ‘dirty war against Podemos’, with the creation of the fake-news that Pablo Iglesias was financed by Venezuela and Iran through the Operación Pisa (‘Pablo Iglesias Sociedad Anónima’), as promoted in January 2016 by El Confidencial, OKDiario and other far-from-impartial sources. Then, as the Chief Inspector José Ángel Fuentes Gago said a few months later (after flying to New York to investigate another fake claim against Iglesias), ‘If it helps us prevent Podemos from getting into the Government, then so much the better for everyone’. One title chosen at random from OKDiario claims ‘The confession of the Narcodictudura Chavista (i.e., Venezuela) spy chief to Judge García-Castellón, that Maduro's assistant gave $600,000 to Juan Carlos Monedero at the Meliá Hotel in Caracas’.

Venezuela in those days was as frightening to a conservative Spaniard as Cuba was (and remains today) to a conservative American.

How extensive were the police inquiries? A report says that ‘fifty-seven detachments, from special units to simple patrol cars, were involved in consulting restricted databases to find out the background, travel and accommodation of Pablo Iglesias and other party members’. Some 6,900 improper searches were made in the Ministry of Interior’s sensitive files in 2016 and 2017 by the national police says another source.

Following a complaint by Iglesias and others, we read that ‘Judge Santiago Pedraz agrees to investigate the dirty war of the PP Government against Podemos. The magistrate admits the party's complaint against Mariano Rajoy’s secretary of state for security together with the operational chief of the Police appointed by the PP and other commanders of the Corps for "alleged prospective investigations" and without judicial control’.

Ctxt, a Podemos supporting news-site, says that ‘…The determination of the PP and Rajoy to remain in power explains this dirty and illegal spying operation. It is probably the most serious affront to Parliament since the failed 1981 coup against Congress by Antonio Tejero. In both cases the goal was to subvert the popular will expressed at the polls…’

Like Podemos or not – one still needs to be seen to be abiding by the rules.  

…...

Housing: 

Empty Spain might be ever more empty, as folk move to the cities, but in Northern Madrid, the opposite is true. From El Confidencial here: ‘…Paradoxically, while la España vacía struggles daily to combat depopulation, rural Madrid is growing at an accelerated rate. The population of villages with less than 2,500 inhabitants has grown – between 2018 and 2022 – by a total of 8.5%. The same growth elsewhere in Spain is reduced to a minuscule 0.2%’. 

…...

Tourism: 

Don’t rock the boat over tourism… 

Majorca Daily Bulletin leads with ‘Global tourist industry calls for an end to anti tourism protests’. 

From Hosteltur here: ‘The Spanish Tourism Board has called on all public administrations to react "urgently" to demonstrations against tourist overcrowding and has asked for the condemnation by "all political parties" over any act of harassment or attack against tourists’. 

From 20Minutos here: ‘Exceltur says that climate change does not harm tourism, explaining that "That study was probably done by an intern"’. 

‘Spain is finding innovative ways to cut down on tourist apartments, even banning them completely in some places. In Spanish cities suffering from over-tourism, rules have slowly been introduced to help regulate numbers, including limits on the number of tourist rentals. Despite this, statistics from the Spanish government show that the number of tourist apartments has increased by nine per cent in the last year, with more than 340,000 now registered. This means in some cities there is one tourist rental for every 1.5 square kilometre and for every 139 locals…’ Item from EuroNews here. 

It’s one thing closing down privately-owned tourist apartments, but… ‘Barcelona hoteliers seek to avoid the closure of the 46 tourist apartment buildings they possess. The president of the Hotels Guild, Jordi Clos, is confident that the veto announced by the City Council will only affect “loose” apartments’ says El País here. 

From The Times: ‘Spanish tourism chiefs attack ‘stupid’ protesters. Hoteliers have hit back at ‘not very smart’ activists who don’t realise how much visitors are worth’. We read that ‘Tourism is a serious business in Spain, accounting for 12.8 per cent of GDP in 2023, with visitors spending €108,700 million’.   https://archive.is/dn6XO 

The director of tourism for the Canary Isles Jessica de León has called for a ‘pact against turismofobia’ says El Diario de Las Palmas here. 

The cruise industry is growing, but the destinations are being revised. El Comercio reports that ‘The cruise industry will increase its capacity by 10% in the next five years, according to the forecasts of the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), which rules out that the social response to mass tourism will affect its turnover, although it will change the destinations that they travel to. "Turismofobia is not only a problem in Spain, but also in France and other Mediterranean countries, but visitors are increasingly sensitive and the violent attitudes that have been seen in places like Barcelona have an impact on the destination's reputation," said Marie Caroline Laurent, CLIA's European director, during a visit to Madrid this Tuesday…’ 

20Minutos writes of an ‘Historical record for tourism in summer: the Government foresees 41 million visits to Spain and a 22% increase in spending. The Minister of Industry and Tourism, Jordi Hereu, says that the arrival of foreign tourists is expected to be 13% higher than the same period in 2023’. 

‘Eight Spanish destinations ruined by tourists in recent years’ with Business Insider (en castellano) here. They are: Binibeca Vell, Palma de Mallorca, Río Chíllar, Park Güell, La puerta azul de la cala del Portixol, Los problemas del Camino de Santiago, San Juan de Gaztelugatxe and La playa de Las Catedrales. Huh, plus my local bar… 

From The Huff Post here: 'It's Tourist Hunting Season': The street art that's seething about mass tourism. Graffiti, street art and sticker campaigns are being deployed amid mushrooming protests against over-tourism in Spain’. 

‘1,400 million people will have to apply for an ETIAS authorisation before travelling to the EU by the middle of next year’, says Schengen News ominously. 

…...

Politics: 

Over the issue of sharing (a few of) the African ‘los menas’, the unaccompanied minors who have survived the dangerous crossing from Mauretania to Tenerife, Santiago Abascal has broken with Alberto Núñez Feijóo and ordered his councillors in various autonomous regions to pull out of the power sharing in those governments. You just wait until they rape, rob or kill someone says one of their more ridiculous politicians during his resignation.

The regions which had a PP/Vox partnership until last week are Castilla y León, Aragón, la Comunitat Valenciana, la Región de Murcia and Extremadura (the Extremadura councillor stayed, but has resigned from Vox). Now the PP must either run as a minority government, call for fresh regional elections, or hope to find partners to shore them up. The next concern is whether PP/Vox town halls could also be affected.

Diario AS says ‘Earthquake at Vox: “Abascal has destroyed the party”. The decision to break with the PP in the regional governments causes discomfort both in the 'popular' formation and internally: "We have committed suicide"’.

Under the heading ‘Spain’s far-right Vox quits key regional governments over migration row’, The Guardian says that ‘The Spanish PM hails a great day for Spain after party pulls out of coalitions with conservative People’s party’.

El Confidencial interviews Santiago Abascal here: "If the PP wants my support, I will demand a deportation plan for illegal immigrants". The leader of Vox defends his anti-immigration speech as an existential cause and accuses Feijóo of having secretly agreed the pact with the Government with the idea of ​​"keeping it secret" until after last year’s general elections’. The concern at Vox isn’t so much losing supporters to the PP, as losing them to ‘el agitador ultra’ Alvise Pérez in a future regional or national election.

El Mundo, backing up its claim with figures, says that ‘most Spaniards see Vox's break with the PP as unjustified and believe that it will only benefit the PSOE’.

Finally, La Cadena Ser says the Partido Popular will support the government under certain conditions: ‘The PP requests the declaration of a migration emergency in Spain as a condition to support the reform of the Immigration Law’. 

The erstwhile vice-president of Castilla y León, the Voxxer Juan García Gallardo, has left his job following the Abascal/Feijóo bust-up, but has landed another as Vox party spokesman in that region… and with an increase in his annual pay of 21,000€. He can now enjoy over 100,000€ per annum for doing what he does best. 

Alvise Pérez says that the moment a general election is announced in Spain, he will resign as an MEP to stand as presidential candidate. ‘I mean to get Pedro Sánchez out of La Moncloa’, he says. The story is at El Economista here. 

In Congress on Wednesday: ‘Sánchez proposes that the media make their ownership public, detail how they are financed and reform the law of institutional advertising. The President of the Government warns that “the repeated consumption of fake news is linked to the rise of the extreme right or xenophobia, anti-Semitism and homophobia” and affirms that “without free and quality media there is no democracy”’. The reaction to this by the media depends inevitably on who pays the bottom line. The story comes from El Huff Post here. From ABC here: ‘Feijóo to Sánchez, the greatest bulo of them all is you’. 

An election promise that has finally found its way to the head of the queue: the security law known in the Street as La Ley Mordaza (the Gag Law) – a law from the previous PP government – is to be partially repealed after an agreement between Sumar and the PSOE as part of a ‘Democratic regeneration’. La Cadena Ser has the story here. Details here. Sad to relate, the police get to keep their rubber bullets for protesters. 

From La Razón here: ‘Juanma Moreno establishes himself in the centre with Vox and the PSOE ever more at the extremes. The breakup of the extreme right party with the PP in other communities reinforces the position of the Andalusian president’. 

……

Gibraltar: 

Following from Spain’s victory over England in the Eurocopa, a few jokes (or maybe, not so funny?) about Gibraltar Español. Whether they were all light-hearted or otherwise, says ABC here, they all went down badly in la Peñon. Sur in English picks up the story: ‘The government of Gibraltar has been quick to respond to the chants of the Spanish footballers as they celebrated their Euro 2024 victory in the final against England during a welcome home party in Madrid…’ I had heard elsewhere that if England had have won the championship, then Benidorm instead would have become the subject of the jokes. 

…...

Europe: 

From 20Minutos here: ‘…The radical right has gone from wanting to form a single super-group to dividing into three, with one more political family than in the past five years. On the right side, ECR remains the only group that survives since 2019 (Meloni and Poland’s Morawiecki), with two others that are new: the Patriots for Europe, founded and led by the Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán, and the Sovereignists, who are a splinter with AfD at the head. Those last two steps completely buried Identity and Democracy (ID), the political family that Marine Le Pen and Matteo Salvini sponsored five years ago and that has now disappeared’. Alvise’s eccentric Se Acabó la Fiesta party stands alone outside these groups. (With graphic). 

From DW here: ‘Locals bear the brunt of mass tourism in southern Europe. Many tourist spots in Europe are expecting record numbers this summer. And locals are increasingly on edge. They want lower rents and a fairer distribution of resources’. The interesting article has a paragraph titled ‘Where does the money go?’

It says: ‘Where does all the money go that travellers to Mediterranean countries spend? According to Paul Peeters, who researches sustainable tourism and transport at Breda University of Applied Sciences in the Netherlands, a large part of it goes to airlines, major hotel chains, international companies, and the cruise industry.

When it comes to calculating tourism cash flows, the mode of transportation selected can prove a decisive factor. People on cruises usually sleep and eat aboard. People who buy vacation packages and book flights, hotels and meals through large providers rarely spend much money on the ground.

However, they do contribute to pollution and consume valuable resources such as water, thereby adding to the burden on locals, which can exacerbate the feeling of inequality and fuel tensions between visitors and locals…’ 

…...

Corruption: 

InfoLibre interviews Pablo Iglesias on the revelations on the previous government’s plot to sink Podemos: “We are surrounded by gangsters in the highest judicial, police and media spheres”. 

…...

Courts: 

Chaves, Griñán and the ERE. The Constitutional Court has ruled that the two ex-presidents of Andalucía are partially absolved of malfeasance and – in Griñán’s case – embezzlement (so he will never have to go to prison), while both will be sentenced again only in relation to their prevarication (deception). The story is at 20Minutos here. The current Andalusian government, under the control of the Partido Popular, is not at all happy with this development, says Infobae here: ‘The Minister of the Presidency Antonio Sanz considers it "shameful" and "insulting" for Andalusians "to see the PSOE boast about the ERE, which is the biggest disgrace and case of corruption that has ever occurred in the history of democracy’. Certainly, in the bad old days of the various PSOE governments in Andalucía, the region enjoyed a poor reputation for honesty in the rest of Spain.  

Coming up is this Friday is the interview between Judge Peinado and Begoña Gómez. 

…...

Media:  

The celebrations following the Spanish European Cup victory were slightly marred after one of the Rojos slighted the President of Spain. The player, known for his right-wing views, is Dani Carvajal and he failed to respond to a handshake from Pedro Sánchez – to the evident delight of such people as Vito Quiles, the ‘journalist’ who is close to Alvise Pérez. We read on one of his Tweets that ‘Being a good Spaniard is incompatible with supporting the Spanish Traitor’. A Tweet from another perspective here. 

…...

Ecology:

‘The serious drought threshold in Málaga capital jumps when the reservoirs of the Guadalhorce system drop below the 71.4 hectometres stored. Until May, thanks to the rains over Easter and so on, they reached 85 hm3. The Drought Committee avoided lowering the severity level because it sensed what was going to happen. And it has happened. The provincial reserves began their decline on May 13 and it has been more pronounced in Guadalhorce, Guadalteba and Conde de Guadalhorce. Together, this past weekend, they barely added up to 67 hm3. Last year they had 113…’ From Diario Sur here. 

Sur in English says that there were 630 flights in or out of Málaga airport last Sunday. 

From The Olive Press here: ‘Heat-wave warning in Spain: Highs of 44C as blast of hot African air to usher in a week of extreme temperatures’. 

…...

Various: 

Regarding the Spanish national football team, Los Rojos. They were always ‘The Reds’ although after the coup d'état of 1936, the dictatorship switched out the red from the shirts of the Spanish soccer team for white. When the Civil War ended, the Falangists said that Spain could not wear red like the communists, and they imposed the blue shirt, like that of the Falange and European fascism of the time. The ABC has more here. 

El Debate (one of the more ridiculous digital newspapers) says ‘Pedro Sánchez has attended the Berlin Olympics to support the Spanish team and has done so in a fairly informal style, as he has chosen to leave his tie at home’. That’s right, and he was seated just a couple of rows behind Felipe VI! 

La Razón comes out with a remarkable claim – that like the word guiri is a somewhat rude term for a Nordic foreigner – usually a Brit tourist or resident, the English have one just as rude for the Spanish. And what could this word be? (There are a few Cockney ones I’m sure). The word they object to is ‘Spaniard’. Very odd. (A reader who teaches English and works as a translator tells me that, indeed, ‘Spaniard’ is not nice. Who knew?). 

From The Independent here: ‘The true face of over-tourism in Spain as homeless levels rocket. Spain homelessness is up 24% since 2012 as the tourism boom fuels short-term rentals’. The article says that ‘…The rate of homelessness has risen by 24% since 2012 to 28,000 people, according to official statistics while, according to a Bank of Spain report, about 45% of people living in rented accommodation are at risk of poverty or social exclusion, the highest proportion in Europe’. 

The Guardian brings us a novel set in Seseña, the abandoned apartment-block city outside Madrid. ‘Far’ by Rosa Ribas (in English) here. 

The Andalusian flag (green, white and green) is called La Arbonaida. But why? The word means something like ‘mi tierra’ in andalusí. It is, however, a modern invention… 

The Northern Irish Protestants held an Orange March (video) in Benidorm this past Sunday. This march celebrates the Battle of the Boyne (1690) over the Irish Catholics, and is considered by many to be ‘divisive’. 

…...

See Spain: 

From Granada Hoy here: Neither bars nor shops: the ‘silent’ Granada town of Cástaras, victim of depopulation where travellers arrive seeking charm and nature. This old mining town is the living example of Granada in decline, it only has a rural hostel and a pharmacy’. 

Fascinating Spain brings us ‘Gorgeous Spanish museums that are forgotten in most tourism guides’. Let’s see… The National Sculpture Museum, Valladolid; The National Museum of Roman Art, Mérida; The Cerralbo Museum, Madrid; The Picasso Museum, Barcelona and The Spanish Museum of Abstract Art, Cuenca. 

A good place to enjoy a bird’s-eye view of Madrid is over a meal or maybe a cocktail. Idealista brings us ‘Recommendations for the seven best roof terraces to enjoy a delectable meal and Madrid's skyline’. 

…...

Letters: 

Hi Lenox,

So many Spaniards have forgotten that many of our parents and grandparents had to emigrate as well. But, of course, the grandparents of those in the PP or Vox party were the ones forcing the other grandparents to emigrate.

I think there will be a museum of some kind dedicated to the SS Stanbrook, the ship that transported thousands of Spanish Republicans to Oran at the end of the Civil War. (Not that the French treated those refugees very well, which is why we should have compassion to those who come to our shores).

María 

Hi Lenox,

Surely, the town halls have contributed to a large extent for the lack of long term rentals, the rise in the cost of rentals and the lack of affordable property for locals. By issuing so many tourist licences, a lot of property has been purchased in order to be used for short term holiday lets.

Irene 

Dear,

I hope this email finds you in great spirits. My name is Hazel Victoria, and I am interested in contributing a guest post to your esteemed website. I believe my content will resonate well with your audience and provide valuable insights.

Kindly share your guidelines for normal link insertion within the guest post. Additionally, I am interested in exploring the possibility of a casino promotion on your platform. Could you please provide information about the casino price package?

Thank you for considering my request, and I look forward to the opportunity to collaborate with you.

Best regards, 

…...

Finally: 

Did we do this one before? Why, it’s not even in Spanish. La Denrée from La Rioule des Compagnons du Monde. C’est magnifique ça. On YouTube, you can enjoy it ici.

 

Sigue nuestras noticias