Tourism Law in Europe

With a basic state tourism law in Spain, the acquis communautaire , in terms of prior authorisation or responsible declaration, would be incorporated, with a single concept of compelling reason of a general interest being coined. Moreover, the same measure would be applicable in any territory – unlike what happens today –, ensuring an elementary principle of legal security 19 . Nevertheless, it is not enough for tourism to be a state competence. We believe that the European Union should assume legislative competence on certain sub-matters of tourism, so that the Member States would cede them to the international organisation. The examples of France and Italy, in other words, the existence of a Tourism Code, provide a better option than Spain’s case but are far from being the best solution. This happens because tourism, as we indicated above, quoting Prof. Martín-Retortillo, is a cross-border matter and it must be treated as such. In effect, giving a national focus to an international matter – to a maximum degree with the use of technology – is meaningless and harmful to legal and economic traffic. A European Tourism Code is needed, which may not regulate all matters relating to tourism, but does regulate those sub-matters that have an evident component of supra- state relations. We have referred to tourist contracting, which presents a series of first- order inconveniences such as the determination of the applicable norm, the jurisdictional forum before which to present the action. Only a global treatment of tourism law, going beyond strictly state visions, can give rise to the necessary legal certainty for transactions in the matter of passenger transport, goods, accommodation, intermediation, among others. All this takes place without prejudice to the suggestions and recommendations that a soft law can serve as a springboard to formulate an organisation of a broader spatial scope, such as the UNWTO, being able to contribute to a progressive harmonisation of the legislation of its Member States. This harmonisation already occurs in other areas, such as data protection, transparency, open government or the reuse of public data, therefore, asking for the harmonisation of tourism legislation is nothing new. So let us undertake a global tourism law. 19 BAUZÁMARTORELL, F. J. “Hacia una legislación básica en materia de turismo. A propósito de las centrales electrónicas de reservas turísticas”, Diario La Ley 27 May 2014.