COMPETITION PROTECTION IN THE TOURISM SECTOR IN ITALY 343 The Authority has also adopted numerous opinions under art. 22 of the law no. 287/90, considering the provisions of certain regional laws in contrast with the national and community principles on competition, since they ended up requiring that the owners of accommodation facilities carried out themanagement of their business in a continuous way, thus introducing an unjustified limit to the exercise of the business activity – which should indeed be organised independently28. In other cases, the Authority considered unjustified the imposition, introduced in a regional law, of specific property characteristics to be able to operate as a B&B, as well as the predetermination of a number of available rooms. Such measures were, in fact, relevant to determine an unjustified compression of competition, sacrificing autonomous entrepreneurial initiatives29. Going into the details, it seems appropriate to recall the considerations made by ICA in an opinion of 8 August 2018, concerning a “Regulation for non- -business non-hotel facilities” adopted by the Piemonte Region (hereinafter, also “Regulation”). This analysis provides a meaningful picture of the principles usually affirmed by the Authority to protect competition in the tourism sector. The Regulation presented a series of critical issues generally noted by the Authority in its advocacy activity on the subject, concerning: a) the time limitations regarding the minimum and maximum working hours of certain tourist activities; b) the imposition of constraints of a dimensional nature; c) the impositionof functional requirements; d) limitations regarding the administration and preparation of food and drinks; e) hygienic-sanitary limitations; f ) constraints on holiday accommodation; g) the unjustified limitations of certain activities; h) the unjustified differentiation, in terms of requirements and characteristics, between entrepreneurial and non-entrepreneurial activities; and i) the unjustified limitations on the access to and the exercise of non-hotel accommodation activities. This Regulation was the object of numerous reports by non-hotel facilities operating in the region of Piemonte. On the one hand, it established a series of time limitations, as well as technical and hygienic-sanitary requirements for non-hotel and tourist accommodations; on the other hand, it established functional limitations (such as minimum quality standards to classify non-hotel accommodation facilities by class) that, according to the Authority, were not 28 ICA Opinion, AS1448, 12 September 2017, in Bull. no 44/2017 and AS1433, 17 August 2017, Bull. no 40/2017. 29 ICA Opinion, AS1594, 28 May 2019, in Bull. no. 27/19.
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