The correbou in Fornalutx will not be outlawed.

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New animal-welfare legislation in the Balearics, aimed principally at banning bullfighting, has run into two major obstacles.

The original legislation planned a broad reform of existing law on animal protection, but this led to concerns that it would lead to an outlawing of certain fiesta traditions, such as the horses in Minorca during Sant Joan. A greater obstacle than this was the ruling by the Constitutional Court that the Catalonian government did not have the power to introduce the bullfighting ban which it had. Once that ruling was made, the Balearic government needed to rethink its legislation.

The new text has now been presented. It targets bullfighting alone but, as has been flagged up previously, it stops short of prohibiting bullfighting (because of the court's ruling re Catalonia) but instead imposes restrictions and requirements to make staging a bullfight impossible. Provisions include, for instance, demands for accessibility for people with reduced mobility to arenas and large liability insurance payments.

A further obstacle has been what to do about the correbou bull-run in Fornalutx. This has created a certain amount of tension between the government parties - PSOE and Més - and Podemos. PSOE faced a particular issue because members in Fornalutx threatened to leave the party if the correbou was banned. Podemos, who had insisted on its prohibition, now appear to be prepared to tolerate its continuing, though they plan to try and introduce an alteration, i.e. cutting the length of the bull-run.

The definitive text and approval of the legislation will not be in place for this summer, which means that the bullfights can go ahead. There are now only three bullrings where they are staged - Alcudia, Muro and Palma - as Inca didn't have a bullfight last year and seems unlikely to this year.