MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Spanish mayor firm on charging fee to tourists visiting Gibraltar

Alejandro Sánchez, the mayor of La Línea has no funds to pay for his administration

Alejandro Sánchez, the mayor of La Lineá, the Spanish town which adjoins Gibraltar, held a press conference Monday evening. He was accompanied by his council members and briefed the media on his controversial plans to charge an entrance fee to tourists visiting The Rock.

He said that works to redirect traffic flow, and provide an infrastructure to allow his proposed toll would start the next day, and that the toll itself would begin to be phased in after 90 days on an experimental basis.

He stated that the charge would apply to foreign tourists, and also be levied on lorries entering Gibraltar. He was particularly critical of lorries carrying building materials to develop new housing on the Rock and said they would have to pay more. The toll for cars would be set at five euros. Despite in an earlier interview stating that Gibraltarians would be exempt, in response to questions from GBC television, he would not say whether that would now be the case or not.

He was openly critical of the socialist Government in Madrid, and said that traffic was a municipal matter for his council to determine, and that the municipal Police who were answerable to him would control it.

It is uncertain where the money for the infrastructural works will come from, as the council claims it cannot pay its workers. Under the 2006 Airport agreement made in Cordoba, Gibraltar agreed to build a new terminal which would allow for joint use of the airport. This 100 million pound project is underway with completion expected on target in May 2011. There is no sign of any works on the Spanish side, and the walkway which would allow passengers for Spain to be cleared through customs in Spanish territory ends abruptly at the frontier fence.

At an earlier press conference after a technical meeting of the trilateral talks between Britain Gibraltar and Spain, Peter Caruana, Gibraltar’s Chief Minister remarked that works on the Spanish side were entirely a Spanish matter but Gibraltar would keep its end of the deal and be ready on target. He noted that under the Cordoba agreement Spain would open an Institute Cervantes in Gibraltar but so far they had not refurbished the two rooms made available for this.

The Gibraltar Government declined to comment on the plans for a toll, but issued a statement saying that “The abuse by politicians of police powers over citizens is not acceptable in a democracy. The Mayor of La Lineá must find means of conducting domestic politics with his central Government that does not involve instructing his police force to harass Gibraltarians.”

 

A spokesman for the British Foreign Office said that they were closely monitoring the situation, and considered it a matter for the Spanish Government to resolve, they had made them fully aware of their views on the subject.

By Jim Watt - Gibnet.com - Gibraltar