Anti-tourism protests that have ignited across Spain could be coming for France.
Local resentment is growing in one of Britons’ favourite holiday destinations in the country’s north-west as wealthy tourists from home and abroad drive a surge in Airbnbs and snap up second homes.
The situation between tourists and locals has become particularly tense over the last month in Finistère in western Brittany, where resentment has spilled out into the open amid a housing shortage.
In Penmarc’h, a commune in the south of Finistère, two incidents occurred on 16 August. A tourist who was out jogging was brushed by a man on a bicycle who told her to “get out of here” because she wasn’t “from round here”, while “tourists go home” was found graffitied on a wall, local media reported.
Not even French visitors have escaped the backlash, with cars with Paris number plates vandalised. Ten minutes away, the town hall in Plobannalec-Lesconil said a car had been scratched with the words “No to Parisiens”, with its mayor Loïc Le Fur revealing that there had been more than four incidents of such vandalism. Meanwhile, in the small coastal town of Plogoff, the mayor discovered a sign reading “Parisiens out”.
