Spain’s Costa Blanca British Expats are Amongst Biggest Coronavirus Lockdown Flouters

AREAS of the southern Costa Blanca with high non-Spanish populations are seeing some of the largest instances of the State of Alarm rules being broken.

Municipalities and Local Police forces suggest that some foreign residents believe that they are back in Britain and Germany, and choose to follow those country’s lockdown procedures, rather than those in Spain.

“There is a lot of ignorance. The majority of foreigners whom we identify and sanction for going out together to go shopping are making the excuse that they did not know they were breaking the law as they just followed the rules of their native country which they had seen, for example, on UK television,” said Cristobal Rodríguez, chief of the San Fulgencio Local Police.

The police and municipalities in the areas with the highest number of non-Spanish residents are running social media campaigns and translating the decrees into English and other languages so that everybody can comply with the State of Alarm laws.

One of two British councillors in San Fulgencio is Samantha Hull, who has foreign residents as her brief.

“We are translating the latest laws and all the official information that reaches us and then we put it out on Facebook and other social media networks,” she said.

Vega Baja region has one of the highest non-Spanish residential figures in Spain, with either people who live permanently in the area, or split their time between their home country and the good Spanish weather.

Around 70 per cent of the San Fulgencio population is foreign, led by British expats, which means the council is being kept busy making sure that everybody keeps to the letter of the isolation law, especially on La Marina urbanisation.

“We keep in contact with non-Spanish associations because we have noticed that it seems to be more difficult for them to observe the restriction on movement measure than anybody else,” said San Fulgencio mayor, José Sampere.

“The Local Police and the Guardia Civil have also increased patrols in areas where foreign residents seem to be prevalent,” he added.
Samantha Hull identified three major issues with British and other foreign residents.

“We have the elderly who do not speak a word of Spanish who get the news by watching television from their own country. It’s difficult to make it clear to them that the lockdown rules are very different here in Spain.

“Secondly, we have fake news and bad translations of official procedures into English on websites and social media portals. And thirdly, there are some people that refuse in any case to listen to anything that is told to them.”

The good news on that last point is that the only arrest in San Fulgencio since the start of the State of Alarm was a British man who verbally abused and attacked Local Police officers when he was told to get out of a community swimming pool.

The main infractions of the current rules involves going outside as a couple either for a walk, to go shopping, or to walk their dog.

“Most still do not understand why they cannot do this and are surprised when they are sanctioned by the Local Police,” said Samantha Hull.

Police chief, Cristobal Rodríguez, added: “People are only meant to walk their dog a few metres from their home, but we find all kinds of examples of rule-breaking every day.”

“For example, we found four non-Spaniards talking to each other close to a park, as if they were attending a meeting. They said they had taken their dog out and just could not understand why they could not interact with their neighbours.”

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Written by

Alex Trelinski

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