Kings of the kitchen
WARNING: Four new tourist signs being used in Calvia’s new ‘have fun with respect’ campaign
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HAVING A FINE TIME! POLICE handed out nearly 200 fines in a two-day crackdown in Playa de Palma. An incredible 40 officers roamed the streets handing out penalties, the majority of whom were tourists. In total, 90 people were fined for drinking in the streets - each facing fines of up to €1,500. Meanwhile, 40 people were sanctioned for walking on the road rather than the pavement, while 34 prostitutes were fined, one of whom had an active arrest warrant for trafficking women. In addition, dozens of illegal street vendors were snared, while their goods were seized.
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Corruption and bad planning has seen €100 billion squandered on ‘unnecessary’ projects around Spain By Laurence Dollimore
CYCLISTS: Into the light
Wheely generous A GENEROUS expat has offered to pay half the bill to light the dangerous Formentor tunnel. The Swiss tycoon wants to see the only tunnel without lighting on the island finally lit up in a bid to help cyclists. Max Hurzeler made the generous offer, after living nearby for years. “It will not be more than €20,000,” he said. “Cycling through it by bicycle is very dangerous because it is very dark and when you are in the centre you do not see the exit.” The tunnel is especially dangerous for tourists unaware of the situation and quickly try to get through the 300 metres of darkness, causing many accidents. The government has yet to reUntitled-1.pdf 1 16/06/2017 spond to the offer.
SPAIN has squandered around €97 billion on ‘unnecessary’ infrastructure projects, a damning new study has found. Unused airports, vanity museums, defunct desalination plants and deserted toll roads are just some of the wasteful projects undertaken. The fast-track AVE railway network - including various lines now shut - accounts for €26.2 billion of bad investment alone. Amid the schemes criticised are Mallorca’s Manacor highway, which will end up costing €500m more than originally planned; as well as the Palma Arena project, which went up from €45m on planned budget, to €110m. The Desalination Plant of Ciutadella, in Menorca, is also slammed for its inefficient use. The staggering statistics have been published in a comprehensive joint report undertaken by nine leading universities around the country. In total, Spain spent over €81 billion on infrastructure that was ‘unnecessary, abandoned, underutilised or poorly planned’ between 1995 and 2016. A further €16 billion will have 15:36
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Black hole DISGRACE: Billions wasted on toll roads and projects like Palma Arena been wasted once the amounts already pledged are taken into account. Regional authority squandering amounted to €34.6 billion of the total, much of it spent on parks, hospitals, cultural centres and events. The list of big spenders is headed by the regional governments of Catalonia (€9.1 billion), Madrid (€7.7 billion), Valencia (€5.9 billion) and
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Andalucia (€2.7 billion). In the comprehensive national study of wasteful spending, undertaken by universities including Barcelona, Sevilla and Madrid’s Complutense, much of the problem was blamed on corruption. While Spanish governments misspent the equivalent of 5% of gross domestic product (GDP) between 1985 and 1995, this figure soared to 20% of GDP
from 1996 to 2007. From the beginning of the economic crisis until 2016, it has come down to around 3%. Among the projects singled out for criticism are the airport in Castellon, tram lines in Andalucia and the Pedrizas toll motorway, north of Malaga.Nearly €5 billion was sunk into nearly deserted toll roads outside Madrid, which had to be bailed out by the state.
Numerous desalination plants, particularly around Alicante, represented over €2.3 billion in ‘cost overruns, inefficiencies or mismanagement’ alone. The City of the Environment in Soria, the City of Light in Alicante, the City of Justice in Madrid, the City of Arts and Sciences in Valencia, and the Alicante theme park Terra Mítica, were all labelled as ‘unnecessary projects’. While a third of the country’s airports are unnecessary - and many were ‘built to attract votes’ - the biggest waste by far though went on AVE railway projects that did not produce the kind of social benefits expected. There were ‘too many multimillion-euro train stations, closed lines, stretches that were dropped halfway through construction, unnecessary lines, and cost overruns’, the report stated. “It was done without a proper cost/benefit analysis, and often on the basis of estimates of future users or earnings supported by a scenario of economic euphoria that was as evident as it was fleeting,” adds the report. Researchers underscored the cost overruns on the AVE lines connecting Madrid, Barcelona and the French border (over €8.9 billion) and on the Pajares Tunnel (€3.5 billion).
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