SMOKE SCREENS

By Jason Moore THREE weeks into the government's ambitious anti-smoking crackdown and the cigarrette companies have decided to hit back. Philip Morris, which makes Spain's most popular cigarrette, has decided to slash the price of a packet by up to 40 cents of a euro. That is quite a reduction in price considering a packet costs around 2.90. This is just another example of how smokers are being exploited and also a clear sign that while the government wants us all to give up the cigarrette firms are trying to make it easier for us to smoke! You would have thought that the Spanish government would have been pressuring the large tabacco companies to actually increase the price of a packet rather than reduce it. I just wonder how long this smoking ban will last. Forty percent of the Spanish population smoke and with these price reductions I can't see them kicking the habit. BALEARIC President, Jaume Matas, was saying at the Fitur tourism trade fair this week that the local tourist industry was making a full recovery. Everything appears to be rosy, he said. Meanwhile, at the same event hoteliers were moaning that the profitability of their businesses in the Balearics had fallen. One major hotel chain is moving out completely to invest in “new resorts.” Meanwhile, the numbers of shops which are for sale or for rent in Palma appears to be at an all time high. With Germany still in recession and Britain rapidly approaching an economic slowdown, why is the Balearic President being so upbeat? Its a mystery to me. I would be very concerned. Everything is not rosy in paradise and if the business community, who are at the sharp end of tourism, are concerned I would have thought the government should be very worried.