WWF criticises court ruling on coastal land

Majorca Daily Bulletin reporterPalma16/11/2015 00:00

The World Wildlife Fund is to call on the next government of Spain to fully repeal the 2013 amendment of the Coasts Law, saying that this is “essential in order to reverse the current lack of coastal protection and to ensure the future for coastal populations and the conservation of threatened ecosystems.”

WWF has spoken out following a judgment by the Constitutional Court on an appeal by PSOE against a law on sustainable protection and use of the coasts and the 2013 amendment of the law that was originally passed in 1988. WWF has called the court’s ruling a “setback” which will lead to coasts being endangered. It believes that a future government must prevent the establishment of “private enclaves” and so remove concessions that are incompatible with conservation.

The ruling, says WWF, has only removed some of the more contentious articles and has done so only in legal terms and not technical, such as on the limits of zones influenced by the sea and on the definition of dunes, which are “crucial” to coastal protection. The court has accepted the reduction to 20 metres from 100 metres of coast in urban areas that is subject to protection and has extended the concessions granted to builders that had been legally made prior to the 1988 law coming into effect.