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Venice will charge tourists who donβt spend the night in the city a β¬5 entry fee
(english.elpais.com)
this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2023
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I'm not a fan - i totally understand why Venice is doing this, but this is a violation of my freedom of movement as a EU citizen. I'm allowed to visit every country in the EU without restrictions and I'm allowed to walk over every public space there if I want to. If Venice is allowed to do a 5β¬ entrance fee for their public spaces and the whole city, there is nothing preventing another rich people town from imposing a 5000β¬ entry fee or something like that and I really don't like that.
How is it breaking new legal ground, if toll roads already exist and are legal and overnight stay tax (aka tourist tax) is too?
Those are related to use of infrastructure/services.
So is this?
Going to the German island of Norderney also costs a fee. Not sure the ferry, but you also pay a certain amount of money per Day. It's called Kurtaxe and it's quite similar to the proposed fee
Kurtaxe is usually just charged per overnight stay in most places. Is that different in Norderney?
In a lot of places it already applies if you enter the beach, so this is not something new I reckon.
I get your point, but this is not about your rights as an EU citizen. I am an Italian citizen and I also have to pay, we are getting the same treatment.
Yeah, it's indeed more comparable to the issues with fees to access beaches that already exist in many places. But of course that is an issue because it limits access to public spaces to people who can afford the fee.
True to an extent, although that is a bit of a can of worms on its own. I don't know if there are any EU laws on the matter, but for what concerns Italian law they can't charge you just for accessing the beach.
Meaning, you have the right to pass through it (as it's public soil) as well as accessing the sea (cause again, it's public). If you use the beach for anything other than walking through it (including sitting, lying down and such) I think the licensee is allowed to charge you. I say it's a can of worms because in practice some places will forbid you access or make it functionally impossible with barriers and such. And usually people can't be bothered to call the cops and fill out papers, so they just go around them.
Ah, thanks, IIrc the rules are similar in Germany.
not the ideal place to bring up freedom of movement. Better to fight for it in other matters. For example border checks between Austria and Bavaria that have been going on for years now.
This absolutely does not violate the EU's guarantee of freedom of movement for citizens. You're conflating your intuition about how that works ("as an EU citizen i have the right to access any and all public spaces without restriction") with what it actually means (EU member states must treat citizens of other EU member states the same way they treat their own citizens wrt entrance, access to employment, taxation and access to government services).
I think, like you, that what they're doing sucks. I think it sucks less than the alternative, which is that the city become nearly uninhabitable to long term residents due to the tourism crush. But this absolutely isn't a freedom of movement issue and to call it one makes you sound like Americans who think that getting banned from Facebook violates their free speech.
Not everything is always a slippery slope argument...Also good luck enforcing this in any other city. This only works in venice because there are only a few ways to get in. To do that in lets say nice you would need to fortify the city...That will just not happen.
Only a small number of countries have full freedom of movement within their own borders (freedom to roam) and Sweden is one of them (allemansrΓ€tten) but plenty of other countries don't. EU freedom of movement only means you can cross borders between EU countries (with related rights for employment, market access, etc). Where you can go within is decided by each country.
Freedom of movement only applies if the restriction on entry is different between nations. If everyone needs to pay the fee, then it is hard to argue that this is restricting your rights.
The thing is you pay a tourist tax if you stay in the city itself already.
The fee will be imposed also on Italian citizens, so doesn't impact at all the right to free movement inside the EU.
UK Citizen here. I'm not a fan of not being part of the EU because of some idiotic referendum "to keep the illegals out". It hurts my freedom.
But what do I do?
This isn't about you.