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WITH the continued fall of the numbers of tourists to Minorca, has the Island become too greedy and failed to invest in the needs of tourists?
Minorca has had it easy for years but tourists will travel to where they get better facilities for their money. In fact the drop in numbers is greater than published. If you take away the property owners like me who make on average four to five trips a year, the actual number of “real” tourists is down more that it would appear.

Northern Europe is having its worst summer in living memory and you would expect the island to be bursting at the seams. However, it isn't and that, I believe, is due to a deliberate Government policy. It is becoming clear that tourists are not welcome on the Island unless they spend their money but do nothing.

There is no proper water park on the island which is amazing for a tourist destination. The island flatly refuses to allow golf courses to be built which would bring in quality tourism in the low season.

Every other tourist destination seeks the quality end of the market and builds golf courses as a fundamental part of that aim. Minorca seeks the bottom end of the market and actually deters qualiity high spending tourists from visiting through lack of investment in such resources.

The island should have at least six golf courses. These facilities would bring in quality tourism and along with it, the revenue the bars and restaurants need. Minorca trots out excuses that it doesn't have the water but if it fixed just a quarter of the leaks in the pipelines, it would have resouces for 12 golf courses! The fact is there is no political will to create quality tourism and I feel sorry for the bar and restaurant staff and owners who work hard to survive on a four month season. Were it not for the tourist bars, Minorca would be an entertainment desert as the authorities only provide enterainment for the needs of locals and not visitors. The once bustling established tourist town of Calan Porter is the quietest it has ever been but what do the authorities do? Create a vineyard and a night market! Do they think that is what the tourist actually wants?

The town could be transformed by a golf course and water park but it will never happen and Minorca will decline as a tourist destination with less people, less flights, less money. Can the island survive without tourism? Well, it will soon find out! Kevin Brewer, Son Tomeu, Minorca