Government Proposes Longer Opening Hours in Major Tourist Areas
July 9th, 2012
The Spanish Government is to propose amending the law on opening hours (1/2004) in order to allow tourist cities to fully liberalise opening times in the areas with greatest numbers of visitors, and is also to propose to the regions that, from 2013, the number of Sundays and holidays where businesses can open to trade, be raised from eight to 10.
Secretary of State for Trade, Jaime García-Legaz, explained that to define which cities these changes shall apply to, they have established objective criteria, such as whether in the last year they have registered over one million overnight stays in their city, or they have received 400,000 visitors who arrived via cruise ships.
Currently meeting these criteria are Barcelona, Alicante, Valencia, Zaragoza, Malaga, Seville, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Bilbao, Cordoba, Granada and Cartagena (Murcia), as well as Madrid, Palma de Mallorca and Santa Cruz de Tenerife, although the latter three are already permitted to open freely to trade in certain tourist areas.
The Government’s proposal includes unifying criteria to establish a timetable of opening hours in all the communities. In addition, they propose increasing the number of hours per week a shop can open (weekdays) from 72 to 90, and to relax the timetables of all establishments with less than 300 square metres, compared to the 150 metres limit set in some regions.
El Mundo reported that within six months from the entry into force of the new regulations, the municipalities of the 11 remaining cities will have to define what they consider to be the areas with the greatest number of tourists, and the proposal must then be approved by the corresponding regional authority.
“Spain is one of the most restrictive countries when it comes to open hours on holidays, which puts us at a disadvantage,” insisted Garcia-Legaz, who then said that these measures are intended to prevent the millions of visitors who come to Spain, from leaving the country without being able to buy anything because they find the shops are closed.
The Government also provided the regions with a declaration statement, prepared together with the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces, which will allow certain stores to open without a municipal license. This will enable the “Auto-Licence Express” to be launched with immediate effect.
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The numbers given in this article seem somewhat implausible. The proposed increase in weekday shopping hours given as ‘from 72 to 90′ implies that shops are already entitled to be open for over 14 hours a day. Not in my neck of the woods they aren’t. And with the increase this would mean 18 hours a day!,
‘the 11 remaining cities will have to define what they consider to be their areas with the greatest tourist inflows’ What does this mean?
‘the minimum number of Sundays and holidays where businesses can open to trade, be raised from eight to 10.’ I think this must be ‘maximum’ shouldn’t it?
Sorry Roger, the author has been appropriately reprimanded.