Hoteliers paint picture of doom and gloom over tourist tax

Its president, Inma Benito, has described the announcement as “precipitous” and has accused the government of a “failure in consensus,” adding that tourism policy should not be focused solely on the design of a tourist tax. Benito has also said that she is surprised at the prospect of the tax coming in next year, given that contracts, not taking account of a tax, have been finalised with hotels for 2016.

She had trusted that the implementation of the tax was to be made with consensus and not through “imposition” and not taking into account economic criteria and so therefore the competitiveness of the Balearics and the islands’ businesses.

She has pointed out that the tax has always been linked to inadequate financing by the state but is critical of the fact that the “only solution and only proposal regarding this lack of financing is to increase the tax burden on businesses without considering the consequences that this may have on the Balearic economy as a whole.”