Editor’s note: This article was first published in February 2011, as news from 21 February 2011. The demands and forecasts belong to that moment; Spain’s 2011 smoking ban (Law 42/2010) was not repealed.
The first move against the anti-smoking law: more than 300 hospitality business owners from Valencia, together with the Valencia Hospitality Business Federation (FEHV) and the Spanish Hospitality Federation (FEHR), will gather this Monday at 11:30 a.m. in front of the headquarters of the Ministry of the Interior to demand the repeal of the Anti-Smoking Law (Spain’s ban on smoking in bars and restaurants, in force since January 2011).
The figures have spoken: what was sold as a measure for the well-being of non-smokers has ended up causing a drop in sales of more than 20% in the hospitality sector.
The FEHR warns that more than 200,000 jobs could be lost if the law stays in place, and that it could lead to the closure of more than 50,000 establishments. The protesters will therefore try to convince the government that it is not too late to scrap a law that, so far, has only hurt the sector and made its crisis even worse.
Owners of nightlife venues, a sector hit hard by the anti-smoking law, have also been asked to join the protest.
Without a doubt, this law has come at the worst possible moment, because the crisis on its own had already eaten into the profitability of the hospitality business.
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Featured image: Keith Williamson, CC BY 2.0, via Flickr.
