Mr. Antich´s own goal

Feeling reluctant to add fuel to the sheer and surely obvious foolishness of the new tourist tax, incomprehensible to me partly because I always naively thought that a socialist leader of all people has the welfare of ordinary people at heart rather than introducing measures that might lead to severe unemployment by making Majorca less attractive in a very competitive market in which the island has been very fortunate so far, not in the least due to the older generation of islanders, who worked extremely hard to create at least the beginnings of a very prosperous place for most of its residents. I knew many of the older generation of Majorcans, and no doubt they would turn in their graves if they knew about the very dangerous games their local government plays.

I wonder if it might be of interest to know that according to rumours in various European countries popular with Spanish tourists, some people are urging to introduce a similar tourist tax to Spanish visitors... Also, it is not quite clear to me if the tax will apply to the many mainland Spanish tourists coming to Majorca. Finally, one might admire some of Mr. Antich's ideas, but the general worry, of course, is the oldest question in the world: who is going to pay for it?

Monopoly money won't get very far, and even just a small drop in the number of people visiting the island - he reportedly shrugged off a 5% drop might serioulsy effect the economic conditions of the island. People will become redundant, which means the kitty will not become even fuller by people paying more taxes. The opposite will be the case, because large amounts of unemployment benefits are to be paid to make ordinary people survive Mr. Antich's Utopia visions.

No doubt many people who know and love Majorca may feel that there is room for many constructive improvements, but.....to rush it is dangerous. It can only be done gradually, step by step, if one wants to avoid perhaps unrecoverable and serious mistakes if not worse. There is too much at stake, achieved over many years so it would be sheer folly to change things over night. No doubt it is a good idea to build up other industries on the island. No doubt there are ways to modernise growing potatoes and what have you, but what Majorca does well in the real world is to see their foreign visitors have a great time. Recent matters such as the bus strike and now the tourist tax, all widely shown on tv in Europe is very bad news to the island. Not even a Majorca song festival star can do much about that...

Mr. Antich is playing a dangerous game as should be clear to him by now. I would have thought that one must be blind and or living in a different world not to understand the basic realities of the matter.

Yours sincerely

Are senior citizens exempt?

Dear Sir,

Could you please clarify who will be paying the forthcoming tax? I am sure I read somewhere that Senior Citizens above the ages of 60/65 will be exempt? We are due to visit the Island May and September for a total of 6 weeks, indeed as we have done for the last 15 years or so. HOWEVER we will seriously have to review our options if faced with this horrendous tax. Is it not enough for the greedy governments to take our money in the conventional manner without resorting to this action which MUST most certainly take away thousands of potential visitors.

Editor's note: Only those OAPs on government sponsored holidays are exempt from paying the tax.

It's obvious why cars cost more
Dear Sir,

The weekend's Media Monitor. It is perfectly obvious why cars cost more in the UK than the rest of Europe. They have to be made with all the controls on the wrong side, the right and that of course costs a lot more. If they put the controls on the right side, the left, then they would cost less. Right?
Regards