Neither the words of businessman Juan Roig asking to monetize the arrival of tourists nor the possibility of opening the debate on the tourist tax hinted at by the mayor of València, María José Catalá, after the Fallas, have affected the positioning of PP and Vox in the Corts Valencianes. Both parties will reject this Thursday the proposals from PSPV and Compromís to recover this tax on tourist overnight stays that was approved by the Botànic but never implemented. A moratorium was made and, after the regional elections, the new parliamentary majority repealed it.
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Compromís and PSPV defended two bills yesterday to tax tourist stays. Interestingly, while the socialists chose to present the same regulation that achieved, after many internal debates and some frustration, the consensus of the left, the Valencianists preferred to “update” the proposal with slight changes, some even in the fees to be paid depending on the accommodations. Nevertheless, the Compromís deputy who defended the proposal, Isaura Navarro, pointed out that the bulk of what was agreed in the previous legislature is maintained because the message was none other than to recover the botànica proposal. Compromís was the first to register the legislative proposal and PSPV followed.
Despite these small nuances, both PSPV and Compromís will support each other today. However, as was clear during yesterday’s debate, there will not be enough votes to pass them. The PP spokesman, Nando Pastor, already warned that their intention was not to rescue a new tax that Valencians would also pay. Similarly, the Vox spokesperson in the Corts, José María Llanos, rejected putting “obstacles” to a sector they consider “essential” for the Valencian Community.
Before the consideration in the Corts, the opinion issued by the Consell had been against accepting the proposals, considering that there is no “substantial alteration” of the circumstances that led to the repeal of the tourist tax and that “imposing an additional tax that discourages visitors” from choosing the Comunitat would affect the economy and employment “negatively.”
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The Consell ruled that “imposing an additional tax discourages visitors” from choosing the Valencian Community
During the debate, the deputies from these groups who defended the refusal to support the recovery of the tax agreed in pointing out that the existence of a levy on tourism “was not going to solve the housing problem.” And along these lines, they wondered why, if the proposal was so good, the Botànic never implemented it during its eight years in office.
And the fact is that the PSPV was never fully convinced of the benefits of this tax and it was not until the end of the second legislature that it gave in, although always subjecting its implementation to it being a “voluntary and municipal” tax. For this reason, yesterday the Compromís spokesman in the Corts, Joan Baldoví, “welcomed” the PSPV’s call for tourists to pay for their stays in the Valencian Community.
