Madeira News Blog

(21st July). ‘Threat Of Italy Puts At Risk 30% Of The Companies In Madeira’s Business Centre’. This would be in the ‘Economy’, section, but there is no economy section today for some reason, and the Diário website seems to be having all sorts of problems and mix ups today. Will check again later, but this story continues from yesterday about the new law in Italy that considers Madeira to be a tax haven.

‘Armas With Capacity Sold Out In August – The 5 voyages anticipated for next month are already all sold’. The ferry will bring more than 5,000 tourists on the trips from Portimão in Portugal, to Madeira. The ferry owner Naviera Armas has even been considering putting on a second ferry, but no application has yet been made to the port authorities. 3,400 of the passengers will stop at Madeira, and another 2,000 will go on to the Canary Islands. 

In national news :

‘Electric Cars Give €5,000 – Sócrates announces financial incentives for electric cars’. The prime minister of Portugal announced yesterday that anyone who buys an electric car will receive €5,000 in incentives, or €6,500 if the person delivers their old car to be scrapped. Companies will also receive a 50% tax benefit. He also announced that he is preparing legislation that will compel new buildings to have recharging facilities for these cars in the garages.

(20th July). ‘Massages To Combat Aggression In Schools – Programme for children has come to Portugal’. Just 15 minutes of massage in the day to day routine of younger children, aged 4 to 12, but it could produce benefits for the rest of their lives. Massages given and received by children are part of a new international program to combat aggression in schools, that has now been initiated in Portugal. The programme was created by a Swedish woman and a French-Canadian woman, both professional masseurs, as well as mothers and educators. ‘Massage in Schools’ is being developed "with a huge success around the world" in schools and other places that care for children, to stimulate the capacity for learning, facilitate interpersonal relationships, and combat ‘bullying’ behaviour or threat of verbal or psychological aggression that occurs without apparent motivation. The massages are done clothed, and cover the head, back, arms and neck of the recipient. Adults will just teach the techniques but not actually deliver the massages. So have I got this right … some kid is getting a good kicking by another kid in the playground at school, and the victim, spitting blood, offers to give the bully a massage? Or does the victim in fact ask the bully  for a massage? Can anyone clarify?

(17th July). Today’s main news headline : ‘MP Orders To Move On Quinta do Lorde – The MP together with the Administrative Court shelved the case ‘Quinta do Lorde’, believing that the project is properly licensed, contrary to the opinion of those who denounced it, Quercus and the ex-deputy of the PND’. The Ministério Público has closed the case, and there are no susceptible invalidities or revocations that will take the case to trial. The order to file was on 15th July. The episode lasted over a year, and the end result is that the regional government, Machico council, and any other administrative bodies involved, are fully protected from further action. The reasons are given, one of which is that the construction is not in fact in a protected zone, a fact that the environmental agency Quercus still contests. This has been a long drawn out saga, that once a public enquiry was forced by all opposition political parties getting together, was then resolved very very quickly. That inquiry was resolved thanks to the PSD-M hijacking the enquiry, refusing to hear the evidence, with the only witness called on being one of their own guys. Anyway, stroke of luck for the developers and investors of Quinta do Lorde, that the matter was resolved within days of the first units going on sale. No doubt there will be a few more brown envelopes winging their way around Madeira this week with thank you ‘notes’ … job well done lads.

‘Aguiar Branco Won’t Comment On The Proposed Ban On Communism – The vice president of Ferreira Leite refers the party position for the debate of constitutional revision’. He excused himself from giving the view of the social democrats (PSD national) on the proposal of President Jardim and the social democrats of Madeira, that communism should be constitutionally prohibited. He said "I think this falls under the issue of constitutional revision, and after that discussion, then of course the PSD will have a position on constitutional reform". President Jardim made the proposal after increasing support for communist parties in the recent European elections.

The leader of one of the communist parties on Madeira, PCP-M, rubbishes the proposal to ban communist parties, and says the proposal is destined for the rubbish bin, as was a similar proposal in 2003 / 2004.

On the same subject, the PSD-M have now delivered the proposals for constitutional re-evaluation to the Legislative Assembly of Madeira. The proposal supports a wide re-evaluation around the political system in relation to the autonomous regions of Portugal (Madeira and the Azores). It will be discussed in the parliament here next Wednesday, with the theme 35 years of democracy and 32 years of regional autonomy, now it’s time for a political and constitutional re-evaluation. After the debate next week the proposals will be sent to the Assembly of the Republic.

‘Jardim Says That Having A Representative Of The Republic Is "A Sign Of Minority" For Madeira – The president of the government defends a system "equal to the Spanish". The representative of the Republic to Madeira, Monteiro Diniz, said yesterday that he was "deeply hurt" by the explanation given for removing his post. It’s a part of being an autonomous region of Portugal, to have such a position, but another part of Jardim’s and the PSD-M constitutional revision is to remove this position. Alberto João Jardim, emphasised that" Portugal is a unique case "because" the representative of the Republic does not exist in any region of Europe with a legislative power. He then goes on to say "Portugal is a backward country for having silly originality". Well if the revision doesn’t go through, that’s another important relationship messed up by Uncle Bertie.

‘Spell Against The Sorcerer : Arlindo Drives Away Critics – The counsellors that weren’t with Arlindo Gomes in the hours of uncertainty were knocked off the list’. All in the name of cohesion, to clear out the slackers, and create a better team. Arlindo Gomes of the PSD-M, and president of the Câmara de Lobos Council, has completely revamped his team that will be presented to the voters for the forthcoming elections (October). The headline suggests that his selection criteria was not based entirely on merit, but the article itself does not have much juice along these lines.

‘€45 Million To Buy 3 Million Vaccines – Minister of Health guarantees sufficient to vaccinate free all the at risk groups’. The government approved yesterday a budget to buy the vaccines for Gripe A (H1N1 swine flu), six million doses in all, that should be available in December / January. Children and pregnant women will not receive any until February, as there are tests to be done to ensure that the population react well to the vaccine.

‘Prices in Portugal are positioned at about 13% below the European average’. The price from the lowest can be tripled compared to the highest, between EU countries. That’s according to an analysis for all member states covering 2008. Denmark was worst for pricing, with 141% of the EU average, whilst Bulgaria had a rating of just 51%. Portugal’s rating specifically in catering and hospitality was 80% of the EU average, making it still a good bet for holidays and tourism. OK that’s economics at a macro level, but the same differential principles also exists at a micro level, where in Funchal you can pay nearly €3 for a medium beer, compared to as little as €0.80 in Ribeira Brava … now that’s reality.

(16th June). ‘Revalue Emigrants – Strengthen partnerships with Portuguese Abroad’. The Secretary of State for Communities, António Braga, warned yesterday of the need for the entire government to engage in the "revaluation of the Portuguese living abroad", and converting that into "concrete actions". "I speak of a population estimated at around five million people, of businessmen, that already exceed about 120 thousand companies". He believes that there is an urgency to strengthen the visibility and recognition through programs and activities "in the field of economy, culture, and preservation of language". He adds "the programs devoted to stimulating investment in Portugal have to take into account those partners living outside of Portugal". That had never occurred to me before, but it makes a lot of sense in a country of 10 million, to rope in another 5 million emigrants to buy products and materials here through their businesses abroad. Now if Madeira were to take the same approach on it’s own, if successful it would probably be out of crisis in a month, there being so many emigrants, but there is one flaw in that plan … how does one export tourism, our main industry.

’73% Of Portuguese Do Not Trust Government Policies To Combat Corruption – The majority believe that government policies are ineffective in this area’. That’s according to an international agency that specialises in this area, and means in terms of confidence the Portuguese people have the 5th lowest opinion in this area in Europe, just behind Greece and Bulgaria, with Israel leading the corruption belief stakes with 86% of their public vote. The author of the study said "corruption is now a truly global phenomenon". Was it ever any different? I am surprised that only 73% were untrusting, but perhaps the other 27% had nice cars and houses, and worked in government.

‘Permits For Foreigners Limited From Yesterday – Until the end of this year only 3,800 new permits of residents will be issued to foreigners’. I already covered this a few weeks ago, and should mention that this does not include European Union citizens who have a right to live here. The justification for the restriction is of course the economic crisis. That limit itself imposes a maximum number of 89 permits for Madeira for the rest of this year. Last year Portugal allowed 8,600 non-EU foreigners to live and work in Portugal. Associations representing immigrants felt that this was "regrettable", "disturbing", "discriminatory", "protectionist", "immoral" and "incoherent."

The Employers’ Confederation yesterday warned Prime Minister, José Sócrates, that the ‘breath’ of Portuguese companies is coming to an end, and consider that there is an urgent need to strengthen measures to support business and to revive the economy. Also, the President of the Confederation of Tourism of Portugal (CTP), asked the Prime Minister to not reduce the measures to support business in the country, because they think that the crisis is now coming to an end.

‘The Government Will Order Vaccine Against Influenza A – Only 5 to 30% of the population will have access’. That was revealed yesterday by the Health Minister Ana Jorge. "This has to do with the sectors of society that we have to cover" she says, stressing that has not yet been defined the sector of the population that should receive the vaccine. "Today, the Ministry of Health and its team are in discussion to reach a decision within a few days" she said, and was expecting the World Health Organization (WHO) "to give some guidance on who should be vaccinated, with the certainty that there will not be enough vaccine for everyone in the world".  Currently, Portugal has confirmed three cases of patients with influenza A H1N1, or Gripe A as it is known here. Ok, let me try and help start the list off … Health Ministers, families of health ministers, politicians, families of politicians, senior civil servants, families of senior civil servants … that should be the 30% quota reached already.