The PSOE denounces that six establishments have not compensated Benidorm for the hotel award for more than 20 years

The Socialist Municipal Group has denounced that six hotel establishments that took advantage of the so-called hotel premium more than 20 years ago to increase their building capacity have still not compensated the Benidorm City Council as required by that law. The deputy spokesman, Sergi Castillo, has explained that, in all these 15 months of the legislature, there has been no significant progress in the necessary procedures to regularise the situation of these six hotels and finally get them to compensate the city with money or land for use.

Castillo has recalled that this urban planning figure approved in 2001, under the municipal and regional government of the PP, was a modification of the General Urban Development Plan, through which four and five-star hotels with open construction were allowed to increase their use up to 40% without it being counted as an increase in building capacity. In exchange, the establishments had to compensate the municipality for this excess of building capacity through an Interior Reform Plan (PRI) in which compensatory measures were materialised, either with land for public facilities or with money. “The hotel prize created supposedly to favour the construction of four and five-star hotels in the city ended up being little more than a tailor-made suit for the establishments, without any real compensation for the municipality up to now”, he said.

The socialist representative has criticised the “paralysis” of the government of Toni Pérez when it comes to regularising the surface area that these establishments have outside the regulations, an irregularity that provides a competitive advantage to the vast majority of tourist accommodation in the city that has scrupulously complied with the regulations and that also undermines the interests of the citizens of Benidorm. “We consider that a huge injustice is being produced for most hotels in Benidorm because while the rest pay their taxes, there is a small group that is not complying with what society requires of them. More than 20 years ago they were allowed to expand their rooms and they are doing a huge business thanks to that authorization that was granted to them by the plenary in exchange for compensation that they have not made nor have they been required to in some cases by the government of Toni Pérez”, he stressed.

He also pointed out that the socialist group has insistently demanded that the necessary legal and technical reports be drawn up to determine the actions to be taken to force the establishments to compensate the city for all the extra they built. Finally, Castillo has demanded that Mayor Toni Pérez “stop defending the powerful” and start working to demand that the offenders process their respective PRIs as soon as possible and thus return to legality.