Tenerife and the rest of the popular Canary Islands are edging closer to introducing a controversial new tourist tax. Fernando Clavijo, president of the Canary Islands and national secretary general of the Canary Islands Coalition, has opened the door to the proposal, which will be debated next week.
His announcement comes as demonstrators against mass tourism and its effect on the island prepare to take to the streets on Sunday, May 18. The protests will be reflected in the other islands in the archipelago, including Lanzarote and Gran Canaria, as well as in other tourist hotspots. Campaigners want “a better distribution of the wealth generated by the sector” and are demanding measures to alleviate the effects that tourism generates on residents due to the lack of political management, such as traffic jams and problems with wastewater.
The lobby group “Canarias tiene un límite” (“The Canaries have a limit”) is calling on local residents to take to the streets, as they did in the first of the mobilisations on April 20 last year, when thousands of people flooded the main roads of the islands with their slogans.
For the moment, Tenerife, Gran Canaria, La Palma, El Hierro, Lanzarote, and Fuerteventura have joined the call, while marches will take place in other cities across Europe, such as Madrid, Barcelona, Granada, Valencia in mainland Spain and even in the German capital, Berlin. Only one of the Canary Islands has yet to announce that it will take part.
One of the main demands of the groups that will take to the streets on May 18 is the implementation of a tourist tax with which to redistribute the wealth generated by the sector on the islands.
Mr Clavijo said he valued “positively” the proposal of the president of the Cabildo de Tenerife, Rosa Dávila, to set an island tax on non-residents’ overnight stays.
He confirmed that his party is open to “exploring” a taxation tweak if a “redistribution of wealth” from tourism through the salaries of workers in this sector is not achieved. However, its Government partner, the Popular Party, openly rejected the implementation of a tourist tax in Tenerife.
The Parliament of the Canary Islands will discuss different initiatives on Tuesday (May 13) and Wednesday (May 14), including the implementation of a tourist tax. Both the president of the Cabildo of La Palma, Sergio Rodríguez, and the president of Gran Canaria, Antonio Morales, are in favour of implementing a tourist ecotax on the islands.
The tax could bring in around €100 million (nearly £84.6 million) in Tenerife alone, the largest and most popular island.
The Canary Islands have always resisted the implementation of a tourist tax, with several attempts being thwarted in recent years. However, with political parties appearing to change their minds, many see the move as inevitable.