The Algarve’s association for hotels and tourist businesses says that may of the proposed changes to the local lettings laws that MPs are pondering, will just make things worse and "speed the rise of illicit lettings, tax evasion and other illegalities, and thus is unfair competition."
For the association, illegal short-term lettings by those property owners who are not registered on the Alojamento Local regime, cause it concern, as lettings are unidentified and “lack control and oversight.”
A survey prepared by the Portuguese Victim Support Association, concludes that people in Portugal do not walk around worried that they are going to be attacked, robbed or abused and are much happier as a result, certainly happier than five years ago when gloom and despondency shrouded the country.
This is how Portuguese responded when asked about their feelings about becoming a victim of crime.
Back in Portugal after an eight year gap, Irish rock band U2 are to play the Altice Arena in September this year.
The concert promoters, Ritmos e Blues, say that tickets to see the band will go on sale from 26 January but are limited to four per person with earlier deals for U2.com subscribers and those who bought the Songs of Experience album before November 30, 2017.
A suspected smuggler of precious stones has been arrested in Albufeira after his apartment was searched and €3 million in uncut gems were found.
About a hundred uncut emeralds and diamonds were hidden in decorative objects and had no certificate of origin. A raid on Tuesday afternoon, January 16th, ended a long period of investigation and surveillance.
The superhuman stupidity of Infraestruturas de Portugal's management has reignited the Berlin Wall conflagration in Olhão which in 2014, divided the city in two by blocking off a pedestrian crossing over the railway line.
Citing ‘safety concerns,’ the crossing was fenced off, with pedestrians including the elderly, incapacitated and mothers with buggies, being forced underground along a narrow footpath alongside a busy road under the railway line - until the company relented and installed a bizarre barrier system and a permanently bored guard.
The Ministry of the Environment has been caught out in a giant fiddle - it has been counting thousands of tonnes of waste sent to landfill sites, as ‘recycled’ in order to make its figures look greener.
Portugal's top environmental association, ZERO, has taken data obtained from the Portuguese Environment Agency on the recycling rate from each of the country's urban waste management areas and cross-referenced the 2016 data as published in the government’s Environment Report 2017.
A dredger has overturned off the Ria Formosa island of Armona. Four workers escaped and have been treated for hypothermia.
The accident occurred at 08:10 on Tuesday morning, January 16th, and is thought to have happened due to the uneven loading of sand but the Olhão mayor said it is too early to draw definitive conclusions.
A notice from the British Embassy today advises that Mr Chris Sainty has been appointed Her Majesty's Ambassador to the Portuguese Republic in succession to Ms Kirsty Hayes.
Mr Sainty will take up his appointment in the summer of 2018.
