Madeira News Blog

(27th June). ‘Drug Addiction Prevention Service (SPT) banks On Municipal Plans – Calheta and Porto Santo are the locations selected for pilot projects’. The way of thinking and working is set to change, with the director of the SPT looking to cooperate on a regional basis to create plans to control drug addiction. “We train the councils and local communities and they themselves respond by cascading the information amongst their staff”. While addiction prevention is a key objective, the effort will not be relaxed in treating and rehabilitating existing addicts.

A lot of good initiatives and announcements coming through from our leaders at the moment: measures to tackle child poverty and behavioural issues, more facilities to feed the poor, new initiatives for drug problems, tourism showing an upturn. All great news. By the way, anyone heard when the elections are? 

Airport access and exit roads will be closed / diverted whilst works are done to improve pavements(?). The dates given are 2 to 7th July for airport passengers, and 11th to 15th July for cargo / freight routes. I guess that means leave a bit earlier if you are planning to fly off somewhere.

Lucky university students that travel between Madeira, the Azores, and the continent during September will be allowed to carry an extra 10kg of luggage on TAP flights, free of charge.

I guess by now most people know that tonight is the final night of the Atlantic Festival fireworks competition. Macedo from Portugal provide the final display, accompanied by the Classical Orchestra of Madeira, in what is called ‘Concert of Stars’. That will see the last of €500,000 of public money literally go up in smoke.

‘Police Recover €45,000 from Robbery’. Thanks to a tip off, an investigation led to police recovering nearly all the money stolen from a residence in Câmara de Lobos. €50,000 was stolen. 2 arrests have been made. I am wondering, and perhaps the police are also wondering, why a resident in Câmara de Lobos had such a large amount of cash at home.

This was in the Welsh press today : Cardiff City and Blackburn Rovers had agreed to compete in a tournament in Madeira along with Portuguese League teams Nacional and Marítimo. But organisers made a shock decision this week not to go ahead with the four-team event and the Cardiff manager is now hurriedly arranging a trip to Portugal, which will include two pre-season matches against Vitoria Setubal and one of Benfica or Belenenses. City officials had spent months arranging their trip to Madeira and a spokesman said: “The decision not to go ahead with the tournament was out of the blue for both Blackburn Rovers and ourselves. We have talked through a number of options and the decision is that the team will be going to Portugal.” Cardiff had in-depth talks with Blackburn Rovers about going ahead with the trip to Madeira anyway with the two clubs covering costs for the tournament. I haven’t seen this in the Madeira press yet, but I found confirmation elsewhere. On another website it mentions the blow for many fans of both clubs who have booked at high season prices to come to Madeira for the tournament.

(27th June). ‘Government Sets Local Elections For 11th October – The decision has already been given to the President of the Republic’. The date was that preferred by all the political parties, that according to law, were consulted on the preferred date. So what happened to the last preferred option reported a week or so ago, that they will probably be held on the same date as the national ones? That means we have to put up with all the political garbage for another two or three weeks!

Front Page News : main source : Diário de Notícias 6/5/2009

 Yesterday’s main headline : ‘Madeira Loses Flight And Four Thousand Tourists – Thomson Airways ceases to operate it’s weekly flight between Cardiff and Madeira. It was a well sought after and used flight, with an occupation rate of 87%’. Thomson are currently responsible for 8% of the tourists coming to Madeira. One of the reasons given is the high cost of airport taxes here, compared to many other destinations, some even having no costs through government subsidies. Last Summer the flight brought in 7,813 tourists, so why the loss will be just 4,000 I am not clear. If that is the main reason, then that is a cause for concern, as no doubt Thomson will be eyeing up other changes to it’s offerings, as well as other tour operators. Lets hope that at least this will shake up the politicians into doing something quickly, and stop tinkering around the edges of this problem which has been known about for years. If the airport expansion had been done with public funding instead of private investment, then we wouldn’t be in this situation.

The Naviera Armas ferry will not make the already promised second weekly trip between Madeira and Portimão (Portugal) this Summer, alleging that the U-turn is due to restrictions imposed by the port of Funchal. The Spanish company regrets the decision, saying that it was generating plenty of demand, and will now just keep the same service as previously. Bruno Freitas was incredulous. The president of the Administration of Ports of Madeira was caught by surprise, assuring us that that APRAM had already given approval for the second docking here. It doesn’t give any details of the restrictions mentioned, but it’s nice to know that the Port of Funchal has sufficient confidence in future visitor and passenger numbers to be able to turn down another potential source.

TAP Portugal and SATA have broadened their commercial cooperation and joined forces in increasing a joint offer of flights to new markets, namely the Azores region. Intensification of this cooperation is reflected in the widening of the scope of the code-share agreement that the two companies have maintained since the year 2000. This now covers a vast network of destinations in Europe and also in mainland Portugal, reflected in the offer of a better service and more benefits for customers as well as contributing to greater visibility abroad of the potential of the Azores as a tourist destination with unique characteristics.