The Legal Impacts of COVID-19 in the Travel, Tourism and Hospitality Industry

Therefore, it is a consensus that consumer law on its current scale has an international dimension 39 . Consumer law legislation is not only domestic law, but also a fundamental right of some processes of economic integration 40 , especially the EU. Since the Council Resolution of 14 April 1975, on a preliminary program of the European Economic Community for a consumer protection and information policy, consumer protection has become one of the most transversal EU policies at EU level, today with more than 90 texts (Directives, Regulation, etc.) “ as part of the effort to establish a «Europe for citizens» ” 41 . Article 169 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) defines specific objectives of the policy: “ In order to promote the interests of consumers and to ensure a high level of consumer protection, the Union shall contribute to protecting the health, safety and economic interests of consumers, as well as to promoting their right to information, education and to organise themselves in order to safeguard their interests ” 42 . The European Union has developed a set of passenger rights in all modes of transport (air, rail, waterborne, bus and coach) and Directives on package travel, package holidays and package tours – first the Directive 90/314/EEC and, today, the Directive 2015/2302 “on package travel and linked travel arrangements”. It is to note that also special consumer law rules on Private International Law were developed (Rome I, Rome II, Brussels Regulation Ibis, etc.). The MERCOSUR also has a new Convention on international consumer contracts – “Acordo do Mercosul sobre direito aplicável em matéria de contratos internacionais de consumo” 43 –, which has an article about 39 Howells, Ramsay, & Wilhelmsson, 2010, p. 1 40 MARQUES, Claudia Lima. International Protection of Consumers as a Global or a Regional Policy. Journal of Consumer Policy (Dordrecht Online), v. 43, pp. 57-75, 2020. 41 EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT, Consumer Protection in the EU – Policy Overview, 2015, available at https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/IDAN/2015/565904/EPRS_IDA(2015)565904_EN.pdf (Accessed on 28 July 2020). 42 Vid . Articles 4(2)(f), 12, 114(3) and 169 TFEU and Article 38 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and comments on REICH, Norbert , Micklitz, Hans.-W., Rott, Peter, & Tonner, Klaus (2014). European Consumer Law . Intersentia: Cambridge, pp. 290 & ff. 43 See MARQUES, Claudia Lima. Nota ao Acordo do Mercosul sobre direito aplicável em matéria de contratos internacionais de consumo, in Revista de Direito do Consumidor , vol. 118, ano 27, pp. 561-569, São Paulo: Ed. RT, July-August 2018, pp. 561 & ff.