Tourists walking around Palma

Tourists walking around Palma. | R.L.

Andrew EdePalma 13/12/2024 10:01
TW
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The Council of Mallorca, since assuming responsibility for tourism matters, has liked to tell us how well it is progressing in the fight against illegal holiday lets. The current lot, the PP, are clearly doing more than the last lot, PSOE. We know this because the number of inspections related to “illegal offer” from January to October more than trebled year on year. There were 3,102 inspections, yet the number of cases opened over the ten months was 179. If one is being kind by rounding up, this amounts to six per cent of all cases.

According to the tourism councillor, José Marcial Rodríguez, this is evidence of an inspection plan (his plan) being adequate. Is it? What about the remaining 2,923 inspections? Is the inspection department just incredibly slow in processing cases or were inspectors on wild goose chases? That’s a hell of a lot of geese if they were.

And what were they chasing? We shouldn’t conclude that the six per cent were all illegal lets. The councillor has helpfully explained (or perhaps less than helpfully) that the adequate plan helps the fight against all illegal offers, “whatever type they may be”.

The inspection department is to be beefed up in 2025 - numbers of inspectors and case processors. What can we expect - an eight, nine per cent return? But on what? Because the councillor doesn’t actually specify what.