PLN 6.38 per day. They want unfair regulations to be changed in health resorts. The Ministry explains
- The Act of 1991 on Local Taxes and Fees provides for the exemption from the spa fee only for blind people and their guardians.
- The Standing Subcommittee on People with Disabilities and Social Inclusion addressed on Tuesday, October 14, the "unfair provisions" of the Act from the 1990s, calling for the inclusion of all people with disabilities in the provisions
- The Ministry of Family explains that it is up to local governments to exclude additional people from such fees.
On October 14, the Standing Subcommittee on People with Disabilities and Social Inclusion addressed the "unfair provisions" of the 1990s Act.
This concerns provisions excluding blind people and their caregivers from paying the tourist or spa tax.
As the chairwoman of the committee, Ewa Nowak (Polska2050-TD), argued, this is an "unfair" provision, and such a statutory exemption from the fee should cover all people with disabilities in order to facilitate their access to tourism and spa treatment.
Deputy Minister of Family, Labor and Social Policy Małgorzata Baranowska pointed out that the Act of 12 January 1991 on Local Taxes and Fees standardizes a number of taxes and local fees, and also specifies the local fee and spa fee, while the announcement of the Minister of Finance of 25 July 2024 specifies the upper limits of the rates.
She reminded that a local fee for stays for tourist, recreational or training purposes in localities with favorable climatic properties, landscape values and conditions enabling the stay of persons for these purposes, as well as a spa fee in localities located in areas that have been granted the status of a spa protection area, may be introduced by the municipal council.
Under the Act, local taxes and spa fees are not collected from staff members of diplomatic missions and consular offices if they are not Polish citizens.
- These fees are also not collected from people staying in hospitals, from blind people and their guides, from organized groups of children and school youth, as well as from taxpayers of real estate tax for owning summer houses located in towns where the above fees are collected - indicated the deputy minister of the Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Policy.
She added that the municipal council, by resolution, may introduce exemptions from local fees other than those specified in the Act. The council also determines the amount of these fees:
- The local tax rate in places with favorable climatic properties, landscape values and conditions enabling the stay of persons for tourist, recreational or training purposes may not exceed PLN 3.31 for each commenced day.
- The rate and local fee in towns with the status of a health resort protection area may not exceed PLN 4.67 for each commenced day.
- The rate of the spa fee in towns located in areas that have been granted spa status may not exceed PLN 6.38 for each commenced day.
As the deputy minister stated, the ministry's stance on the proposals for statutory exemption from local and spa fees for other individuals is negative. "We do not want, and do not even have, the statutory power to impose such rates on local governments, whether decreasing or increasing them. Any city or commune government can lower such rates, but this is then at the discretion of the commune or city council," she pointed out.
The chairwoman of the team pointed out that "however, these four types of exemptions are imposed (...) and this is an extremely unfair solution, it is completely inconsistent with the idea of equal access to tourism and culture, and to many other things, because this exemption is only available to blind people and their guardians, and not to people with other types of disabilities."
"This is completely incomprehensible, and that's why we're having today's meeting. This isn't about imposing anything, but it's a regulation from the 1990s, which you must admit is unfair and incomprehensible," Ewa Nowak warned.
Deputy Minister of Sport and Tourism Ireneusz Raś emphasized the ministry's commitment to supporting tourism for people with disabilities, including through a currently organized competition to support accessibility to tourist facilities and trails for people with disabilities.
He said that a debate is ahead of us, which will take place at the turn of this year and next, on the tourist tax, understood not as a tax but as an optional fee. He pointed out that various proposals are being put forward, including a kind of social tourist voucher to support tourism outside the peak tourist season, including for people with disabilities. However, this would require additional budgetary resources.
The second proposal concerns greater accessibility to hotel facilities for people with disabilities, because currently hotels meet the required minimum and one larger group of people on a trip must be distributed in different places.
A representative of the Ministry of Health also argued that the issue of fee waivers falls outside the ministry's jurisdiction and noted that, in the context of such a proposal, careful consideration would be needed as to how expanding the list of fee exemptions for people with disabilities would impact the operations of spa municipalities in Poland; there are 47 areas with spa status and eight protected spa areas. Funds from such fees are allocated, among other things, to environmental protection, medicinal resources, and infrastructure development.
Representative of the Ministry of Finance , Monika Derej-Kokotowska , director of the Department of Taxes and Fees Constituting the Income of Local Government Units, emphasized that various solutions could be considered and "there are no doubts as to the justification of the postulate to exempt disabled people from the obligation to pay the spa fee or the local fee", "because it is obviously justified".
She pointed out that the spa fee is currently collected in 44 municipalities, and revenue from this fee last year totaled PLN 125 million, compared to PLN 108 million the year before. She added that in many cases, the fee is collected at the maximum amount, but there are also examples of municipalities where the fee is lower.
She assessed that "it's hard to say that spa municipalities are getting rich off the spa fee." She pointed out that these municipalities also have a number of obligations stemming from their status as spa municipalities and incur additional costs due to increased tourist demand.
She also noted another aspect. "(...) Whenever tax solutions are proposed that deprive municipalities, in this case, of tax revenue, compensation should be provided. Of course, there is no money in the budget for such compensation, " she admitted.
She added that one could consider, for example, compensating for the possible exemption of all disabled people from such fees by increasing the spa fee for other citizens.
Marek Wójcik from the Association of Polish Cities thanked the ministry representatives for defending what constitutes the basis of the state system, namely the autonomy of local government units and the local government system, which provides for the possibility of deciding on matters important to its residents.
He pointed out that local government units have done a huge amount of work to improve the conditions for using tourist infrastructure by disabled people, on the one hand, but also to improve climatic conditions.
As he said, the revenues from these fees are not large amounts for local governments, but they motivate them to take actions to improve spa infrastructure or the climate.
Mielno's representative, Adam Przyczół, pointed out that the municipality is a tourist destination and the fee is 3.30 PLN, which, considering multi-day stays, doesn't represent a significant cost for tourists. "In terms of budgetary scale, this translates to 8% of the municipality's own revenue. That's approximately 5.5 million PLN in the budget," he calculated.
He argued that such funding allows for the development of infrastructure that facilitates travel for people with disabilities and makes various places accessible. He cited the example of special beach access points for people with disabilities and the costs of such infrastructure. He added that any reduction in municipal revenues will directly impact investment opportunities.
"The cost that tourists incur (for the tourist fee - editor's note) is a dozen or so zlotys. That's the price of two waffles for the entire stay. For these people, it may not be a significant amount of money, but on a municipal scale, there are so many micropayments that it creates a real budget for accessibility-related investments," argued the Mielno representative.
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