AUDASE

Magaluf's new drinking laws flouted and doubted in first 24 hours

Hannah Ellis-Petersen in Magaluf Spain The Guardian (London)

 

Local scepticism appears warranted as Britons continue bingeing along Punta Ballena strip despite drinking curfew backed by heavy fines and police presence

David is sitting on the pavement, tucking into a polystyrene tray of chips and gravy, two cans of Stella Artois propped up against his foot. Behind him, his mate leans against the wall, pale, swaying and being violently sick. “He’ll be alright,” said the 19-year-old through a mouthful of chips. “When you’re in Magaluf, you keep going.” Tapping the beer cans, he grins and adds: “The drinking’s not gonna stop here.”

It is 2am on the Mallorcan resort’s infamous Punta Ballena strip and David is far from the only one on this street of bars, clubs and strip-joints clutching a drink. Large plastic cups filled with clear, pink, blue and green liquids can be spotted in the hands of hundreds of the late-night revellers, the majority of whom are British.

Magaluf crackdown: Spanish authorities call time on drinking in the street

Yet, while this is scene is hardly out of the ordinary during the summer season in Magaluf, midnight on Monday marked the introduction of a series of new laws designed to crackdown on the behaviour of the island’s British visitors. An estimated 1 million of them holiday here every year, bringing hundreds of millions in tourism – but also a reputation for drunken debauchery and sexual depravity.

Drinking has now been banned on the street between 10pm and 8am, while fines between €750 (£550) and €3,000 will be issued to anyone caught urinating in public, flashing or swimming naked. Bar crawls, which are one of the most popular and profitable activities on the strip and can attract more than 100 people at a time, are now to be restricted to a maximum of 20 – and bars are only allowed to have one a day having given the authorities seven days’ notice.

In an attempt to prove it is serious about clamping down on the “Shagaluf” culture that has shamed Mallorca and occupied the British press for the past year, the local Calvià council has promised a greater police presence on the streets and will bring in an extra 36 officers to ensure the laws are enforced.

But the raucous scenes on the strip on Monday night proved they have a challenging task ahead of them and most locals and holidaymakers are united in their belief that it will not work.

In a quiet bar off the strip, David, a waiter who was born in a town neighbouring Magaluf, said 36 extra officers were nowhere near enough to enforce real change, adding that drinking on the street was not where police efforts should be focused.

“We are talking over 5,000 people in a single road, how many more police do you think you need to actually make any changes? A lot more than 30, that’s for sure. It would be good if it made a difference but it has to start in the hotel when they [tourists] arrive, making sure British people who come here know the rules and know they will have to pay if they break them. That hasn’t happened so I am not very convinced.”

The source of the drunken troubles, he added, lay more with the cheap prices of the alcohol in the bars and not the drinking between the bars. Blazoned across numerous clubs and British bars up and down the strip are deals such as €7 for two hours’ unlimited open bar, while pints of vodka and Red Bull, and sex on the beach cocktails sell for between €3 and €5. While there is already a law in place that bans drunk people being served, a quick scan of any bar on Monday night proved this was being virtually ignored.

“I don’t think these new rules will stop people coming to Magaluf,” said David. “It is so cheap. They all stay in all-inclusive hotels where they get unlimited alcohol. So it doesn’t matter if they have a drink in their hand or not, by the time they get to the strip at night they are already drunk, they will already kick that bin, cause chaos, start smashing windows or whatever.

“But they will still get served more alcohol in the bars. So what’s the point of bringing in new laws when the old ones aren’t even getting followed?”

One British migrant, who worked in a club on the strip and did not want to be named, said there was so much competition between the bars that they all broke the laws that ban promoters from serving obviously inebriated customers to get people into the clubs and venues.

The one shift many locals said they hoped the laws would bring about was an end to the destructive pub crawls, which often result in scores of drunk holidaymakers tearing through the streets. José, a waiter from the island’s capital, Palma, said he had already seen police stop a group of about 50 on Monday night and issue them with a warning. He hoped it was the beginning of a new era, but predicted there wouldn’t be any real change for years.

“You think when you see 150 people walking down the street, drinking, screaming, shouting, being sick, that is nice for Magaluf? I don’t think so. I hope this will put a stop to it,” he said.

But on the main beach on Tuesday afternoon, Vanessa and Toni, both in their early twenties and from the UK, were among the numerous promoters still illegally canvassing to get people to sign up for various pub crawls and parties happening that night. Neither believed that the new laws were anything other than hot air and said that, for now at least, the 20-person rule for pub crawls looked like it was being ignored.

Back on the strip, Hayley, 32 and from Surrey, works behind the bar at Alex’s, pre-slicing limes to accompany the hundreds of tequila shots that will be knocked back that night. This is the venue that made headlines last year as the club where an 18-year-old woman performed oral sex on 24 men to get a free drink. A video of the act, known as “mamading”, went viral.

Having spent 11 summers in Magaluf, Hayley said she had noticed an increased police presence on the strip on Monday, but added that she was unconvinced it would have any long-term impact on the “street of shame”.

She said: “It’s good that they’re doing it but there are other things they should be concentrating on if they want to clean up Magaluf. The prostitutes are a real problem and muggings are so much worse than people carrying a drink from one bar to the next. And frankly, the fact they are carrying a drink in the two seconds it takes to get from one bar to the next bar is hardly what’s causing the problems. They get there and buy another drink anyway.”

Magaluf, Hayley insists, is no different from any other resort favoured by young Britons looking for a good time. She believes the town has an unfair reputation in the UK press.

“They made a big deal about what that girl did to 24 guys for a drink, but it’s not like that’s happening all the time,” she added. “When they come here they let their hair down – and yes, I’ve seen things over the years that’s made me think, ‘Bloody hell, if I was your mother…’..

“But I can’t see this as the beginning of some radical change or Magaluf ever being a quiet place just for families where nothing bad is going on and no one’s getting naked.”