After the decision that will lead Campania’s beach establishments to be classified with stars based on the services offered, as for hotels, Apulian beach resorts are once again asking for this measure from the Puglia Region.
Among the major supporters of this request, Fabrizio Santorsola, president of Fiba, Italian seaside federation, Confesercenti Puglia, who expresses his disappointment towards a regional administration that too often acts only on the surface rather than taking concrete action.
‘In 2018 – explains Santorsola – a law was passed, with the unanimous consent of the entire regional council, which classified the beaches with stars in the same way as hotels, classifying the structures based on the services provided. It was the right response to the media campaign which systematically saw negative comments on the web relating to the excessively high prices applied in Puglia. To those tourists who thought they would arrive here and pay with beads, hoping to find people with nose rings, the most effective response would have been to certify the quality of the services offered. Unfortunately, the law was blocked by the trade union organizations that manage the beaches near the large centres: these structures, which work almost exclusively with subscriptions, therefore had no reason to add a wi-fi network to their services, ‘they have it at home, what’s the point?’, or hire multilingual staff, ‘my clients are all local: what’s the point of knowing English?’, and so on”.
“The law – he continues – was blocked with a stratagem wanted by those who would have seen their structures downgraded without indispensable services for tourists: in the last council session of the last legislature, the same councilors who had acclaimed it, absentmindedly voted the modification that paralyzed her. Then, with the excuse of the Bolkestein directive which did not give certainty of continuity to our concessions, the union opposing the law, a very strong organization in the region, managed to maintain the blockade. Then came COVID with all the related problems, and it was decided once again to keep the classification firm. Then it was time for recovery after the pandemic and the excuse was good to continue to keep everything still.”
“When, at a certain point, I raised the issue in numerous conferences directly and personally to the regional tourism councilor – Santorsola recalls – he replied several times that it is not possible to apply such a system because it is a prerogative of the central government. My answer has always been peremptory, because all this has no correlation in reality: it’s not true. Even the EU with its HOTREC system (classifying the various forms of the hospitality industry) would have welcomed such a program. HOTREC would probably have lowered the system of classification of services in beaches in all EU countries from above like an ‘umbrella’, but leaving the birthright of this intelligent way of doing a seaside business to us. Now we discover, but I already knew well in advance, that the Campania Region copied our system and applied it by regional law: from next year the Campania beaches will have the classification based on the services provided to customers with all due respect to we Apulian seaside resorts remain and watch.”
