‘tourists Are Bastards’: Britain’s Favourite Holiday Hotspot Has Had Enough

MALAGA – Angered after finding out his rented home was to be converted into a rental for tourists, Dani Romero took matters into his own hands.

His “sticker rebellion” caught on, and residents of Malaga began plastering properties with stickers that said: “A family used to live here” or “All tourists are bastards”.

“I didn’t mean to arm a revolution,” Romero tells The i Paper. “I was just looking for a house to live in. But this cancer is spreading.”

It was the start of a citizen’s revolt by locals against the way their city – a popular destination for British tourists – has been taken over by visitors. “We are not against tourism or tourists but against irresponsible mass tourism,” Romero says.

Two years since Romero launched his protest, the encroachment of tourists in the southern Spanish city has only worsened, protesters say. On 27 June, thousands are expected to fill Malaga in a demonstration which will call for a halt to the building of holiday homes.

It will be the first of a series of rallies set to take place across Spain this summer, as anti-tourism groups show their rage at the failure of authorities to act, with the number of holidaymakers expected to reach 100 million this year.

Last week in Madrid, masked activists vandalised more than 150 tourist properties, pouring glue into the locks and daubing the front of the apartments with slogans like “Get out tourists”. Demonstrations are set to take place in Palma, Menorca, the Canary Islands and Barcelona, while the same debate is playing out across other parts of Europe, as popular cities from Venice to Lisbon struggle to balance tourism with social anger over its consequences.

Rosa Galindo, a member of Un Techo por Derecho (A Right to a Roof), one of the groups organising next week’s protest in Malaga, says one woman she knows faces eviction from the flat she and her husband have lived in for 12 years.

“We suspect the landlord wanted to turn her three-bedroom flat in central Malaga into a tourist flat,” Galindo says, sitting in a café in Plaza de Merced surrounded by the blue plaques of holiday lets. “Maria was paying €550 (£474) per week but the landlord could earn €1,000 (£862) per week from a tourist flat.”

Ana Cortes, 47, was evicted with her three children from her flat in the city centre in 2018 after separating from her husband. “We were paying €400 (£345) per month. It is not much for many landlords… They can make more money from tourists. This kind of thing happens to lots of people in Malaga,” she says.

In 2025, the city received 1.83 million visitors, three times the population of nearly 600,000, according to city council figures. There are currently around 10,000 tourist properties in the city – the same as in Barcelona, a city with three times the population. The number has risen 15 per cent over the past two years. Malaga recently said it will not issue any more licences for such properties, but campaigners say this is too little, too late.

Malaga is now the third most expensive place to live in Spain, after the Balearic Islands and Madrid, with the average home costing the equivalent of £316,229, according to Spanish government data. Foreign buyers make up 19 per cent of all purchases in the city, with Britons the largest group, according to the Spanish National Statistics Institute.

Malaga council did not reply to a request for comment from The i Paper.

Carmen Arcas, of Malaga Para Vivir (Malaga to Live), another protest group, says they are not against tourists, but “they should think again about staying in tourist flats as they are taking our homes”.

In April, Spain launched a €7bn (£6bn) plan to invest in public housing that will ensure subsidised housing cannot be reclassified after a few years and includes help for young renters and home buyers. Campaigners believe the government’s move is too late.

Jaume Pujol, a spokesperson for the group Menys Turisme, Mes Vida (Less Tourism, More Life), which is leading demonstrations in Mallorca, says that for each of the island’s one million residents, 20 tourists are expected to arrive this summer. “Many people are moving to other parts of Spain or Northern Europe where the quality of life is not so good but at least they can find an affordable home,” he says.

Marga Prohens, Balearic Islands’ regional president, has blamed Aena, the state airport controller, for the influx of tourists. The regional government, with support of left-wing parties, has presented a measure to limit the number of flights to the islands. “Our patience has run out with Aena,” Prohens said this month.

Aena did not respond to a request for comment from The i Paper.

In Barcelona, water pistols have become a symbol of anti-tourism anger, with holidaymakers soaked by protesters. The Spanish government and regional authorities want to increase the capacity of the city’s airport, which last year saw almost 1,000 flights a day. Supporters of the plan say they want to attract more business visitors from the Americas and Asia.

This has raised fresh fears among protesters. “We are going to concentrate on the fight to stop the airport expansion,” says Daniel Pardo, a member of Barcelona’s grassroots organisation Neighbourhood Assembly for Tourism Degrowth.

It could be a long, hot summer of protests.