Sustainable Tourism Law

186 SUSTAINABLE TOURISM LAW If we undertake a systematic interpretation of the Explanatory Memorandum and the new article 5.e) of the LAU, it seems clear that in 2013 the state legislator wanted to exclude the rental of homes to tourists from the LAU and, therefore, exclude these lease contracts from the privileges enjoyed by tenants in the LAU: e.g. tenants have the right to an obligatory renewal of the lease for three years. The reason provided for the reform of the Law is that in recent years there has been a major increase in this phenomenon (renting homes to tourists), which could mask situations of fraud and unfair competition. In this sense, the explanatory memorandum states that the reform excludes this type of rental from the LAU “so that they are regulated by specific sector regulations or, failing this, the seasonal lease system be applied to them, which remains unchanged”. In other words, the aim of this exclusion from the LAU is for rentals to tourists to be regulated by specific sector regulations (which must be tourist regulations) or by the seasonal lease system. This starting point underlines how the aforementioned article 5.e) of the LAU should be understood. If we analyse this article carefully, we could conclude that a contract excluded from the scope of the LAU must have the following criteria: – that it concerns a transfer of the total enjoyment of a furnished, equipped home for immediate use; – that the assignment is paid for (the purpose is profit); – that the assignment is marketed and promoted on tourism sales channels; – that the assignment is subject to a specific legal framework, arising from sector regulations. The first two criteria are the least problematic of the four. The third (the assignment is marketed and promoted on tourism sales channels) clearly demonstrates the legislator’s train of thought: it concerns the rental of homes to tourists and, therefore, not rentals to friends or acquaintances, or without using tourism sales channels, although the leases may be short. This is a key requirement for our analysis, whereby as long as tourism sales channels are used to promote and market homes, the leases are excluded from the application of tenancy legislation. The most problematic criterion is undoubtedly number four. Indeed, where the Act states that the assignment of use should be subject to a specific legal