The head of Tourism reiterates that the tourist tax "will be a dead letter before December 31 and that is how we have sent it to the sector"
Minister Nuria Montes predicts in Benidorm that this could be "one of the best summers in the history" of the Valencian Community
The Minister of Tourism, Innovation, Industry, and Commerce, Nuria Montes, has assured today in Benidorm that this summer "may be the best in history" when referring to the expected occupation and last-minute reservations "when we are reaching the dates of maximum occupancy”.
Montes also referred to the tourist tax before the media to reiterate that it will not be applied and that its repeal will be a fact before the end of the year "It will be wet paper" he has asserted.
Montes visited Benidorm, where she was received by the city's mayor, Toni Pérez, and the municipal corporation before meeting in the mayor's office with representatives of the local tourism sector and business associations. After the appointment, she signed the city's Book of Honor and took part in a walk along Levante Beach accompanied by the mayor and members of the local government.
About the forecasts for these dates, the councilor has indicated that "we are going to touch what we call the technical full in a large part of the municipalities of the Community and Benidorm is one of them." In this sense, she reviewed that “last-minute reservations have worked very well and continued to do so even today. And we have a four-day long weekend, very well located, which will promote significant tourist mobility”.
Montes predicted that hotel occupancy will exceed 90% in the Valencian Community. "Prices have indeed risen, not so much the profitability of the companies, which are still recovering from what they have been through these years" However, the minister advanced that "the entire sector, workers and the authorities agree that It's going to be a very good summer, perhaps one of the best in history”.
About the meeting that she held with the tourism entrepreneurs at the City Council, she said that the current situation has been addressed, but also "the challenges that lie ahead, including improving climate comfort, holiday homes, transport, the human capital, which is essential in our activity”.
However, she specified, the star issue of the appointment has been the tourist tax, on which he has insisted that "we are going to notify the tour operator, tourist portals, mediators and in general to all the agents of the sector that have already started the procedures for its repeal and that before December 31 it will be a piece of paper."
Nuria Montes also alluded to the "capital" importance of both national and international tourism and on this point stressed that both the Valencia and Alicante airports "continue to break records month after month and more than 90% of their traffic is international., she added, both markets are so important “that we cannot do without either. And all nationalities are equally important”.
Finally, the councilor has also advocated "adapting" the urban scene to the criteria of climate change "to make a more sustainable city with better climate comfort." It is clear, she said, "that a city with good trees, green areas, and less vehicle traffic lowers temperatures and, therefore, tourist destinations have to go for it".
For his part, the mayor of Benidorm, Toni Pérez, was "satisfied and happy" to receive the minister "and to be able to talk about tourism, share with business associations and verify that the good progress of the tourist season also requires work to draw the lines that mark where we are and where we want to take our industry”.
Pérez stressed that "finally the praise of tourism and the core of the tourist activity is located in the activity of the Consell, with a person in charge who, if anyone knows about tourism in this community, that is Nuria Montes."
