• Tourism Why does Madrid fall in love with the United States?

    More days, more spending and addicted to culture and gastronomy

  • Opinion The right also cancels

Marta Rivera de la Cruz

concludes her visit to the United States to consolidate the

boom

in North American tourism in Madrid with reinforced good symptoms, while at home she is experiencing the biggest shock of her term as Minister of Culture, Tourism and Sports: the accusations of cancellation in Teatros del Canal of a play by the playwright

Paco Bezerra

.

The writer, the only former Ciudadanos member who continues with Ayuso, looks at this controversy in the face.

Has Madrid found a tourist mine in the United States? I have the feeling that foreign visitors are discovering Madrid, and I also think that Madrid has begun to believe it, that it needed it.

The agreement with Iberia has increased connectivity and we are taking advantage of it.

By connecting with Dallas, which is a connection node for a large part of the United States, not only is the Texan market captured, but also from other states. Is Madrid taking advantage of the limitations that Barcelona has placed on tourism? Is there something that we will take advantage of for a long time : the openness policy during the pandemic that caused Madrid to be talked about outside of Madrid, and ended up becoming an aspirational destination, where you can go and see what happens.

And in Barcelona in recent years there has not been a friendly policy neither with the tourist nor with the tourist investment.

tourismphobia

Or surrender to tourism? The congestion situation and the type of tourist in Madrid and Barcelona is very different.

Madrid does not have a sun and beach tourist like Catalonia, with that wonderful coastline, and Barcelona.

That visitor spends less: instead of going to a restaurant, maybe he buys a sandwich for the beach.

That doesn't exist in Madrid, and it's an advantage. Aren't restrictions necessary in certain areas? Flows must be controlled, streamlined, so that there are no crowded areas or times and other empty ones.

That is why we try to take tourists beyond the M-30, which also has a price advantage.

There are agencies that already propose to stay in Aranjuez. Can't the center end up losing its essence? First, we must respect individual freedom and I give an example that has touched me very closely.

If a person has a traditional store,

he is going to retire and they make him a great offer to rent the premises for a chain without any spirit, what do we say to that person?

That he forces his son to keep the haberdashery?

Respecting that freedom, we try to protect traditional establishments through promotion, as we do with century-old taverns and pastry shops, and we will do with bookstores.

This trade is a luxury that makes a difference. Will not all cities end up being the same? It is true that they are more and more similar to each other.

In Madrid it is happening.

The Zuma in London is very similar to the Zuma in Madrid, and they're great, but you have to vindicate the places with their own flavor that you won't find anywhere else.

I took a Mexican sales agent to a century-old tavern the other day and he was hallucinating: '

This is what I want for my clients, because they don't have it anywhere else.' What remains of the successful novelist she was?

Does politics kill fiction? I have not stopped doing things to be in politics.

What I don't have is the attitude to write.

Also, I'm very obsessive.

When I wrote I went to bed thinking about the novel and woke up thinking about the novel.

Now I go to bed and wake up thinking about the Council.

It is very difficult for me to start writing.

It is not a question of time, but of the mental capacity to write. As a former Ciudadanos member, why do you think that the center parties are fleeting in Spain? I do not think that the problem is that a liberal project does not take hold, but perhaps the moment It was very good and he did not know how to take advantage of it.

Personally, my departure was a considered decision, it was not a tantrum.

I still have friends there

but I am very clear that it is a completely closed stage. Will you join the PP? I am independent, but I feel part of a PP government.

I have never been independent.

The decisions of the Governing Council are collegiate and I defend those of all the Ministries.

My commitment, despite not having a card, has been complete. He met Ayuso... Before entering politics and, although we all evolved, he looked like the person he is now. And Feijóo? I also know him before to enter politics.

Since we are Galician... Can you imagine being Minister of Culture with him? No, I can't imagine anything.

In politics and in life, I have been very grateful for the things I have had, but I have never imagined them.

I have neither applied nor expected anything, which is a good way to save yourself from tantrums.

Teatros del Canal will not program Paco Bezerra's work on Santa Teresa.

Why did you avoid giving explanations in the Assembly? It is not like that.

I spoke in plenary of the Assembly on this issue.

The day they called me to the Commission I couldn't go;

I had something else.

He was the general manager, which is something very common.

And whenever I am asked about this, I answer that there is little explanation to be given. The author pointed to political interference. That work was never part of the programming, it was a proposal that did not enter, like others.

It can't be that every time a proposal doesn't come together I'm accused of censorship.

This has happened many times and will happen again.

And in this economically difficult time, you have to be strict [the Community had to finance 50,000 euros out of a total of 90,000].

I am also clear that this matter is taking flight because there are elections in six months.

I understand that Paco Bezerra complains, like any artist who expects to carry a work and in the end does not carry it.

But nothing had been signed, nor was it part of the programming, nor had I entered the Canal to do a rehearsal. The opposition sees censorship. When they talk to me about censorship, I ask if they know the programming of the Canal Theaters.

If we dedicate ourselves to having sacramental cars, okay, but during these years there have been very heterodox, provocative, even debatable things.

I have had to go to the Assembly several times to explain why something had been scheduled [Vox was very critical]. Have they silenced the director of the theaters, Blanca Li [Bezerra said that she blamed "those above"] ?Blanca is free to go wherever she wants.

But I am not going to force a worker to go to give explanations to the Assembly.

That's not fair.

If she wants to talk, of course she can.

But this was already a political circus. Toni Cantó left three months ago.

What activity do you have

Your

Spanish Office? All this year it was closed and now we are working with Tourism on promotional actions outside of Spain, where until now they always went alone.

And I hope to be able to announce the name of the person who will replace Toni soon. Who will it be? I hope to announce it before the end of the year.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Know more

  • Tourism

  • Articles Ruth Diaz