Glavina against Bačić: Mobile homes are not buildings

Amendments to the Spatial Planning Act and the Hospitality Act will be presented to the Government on Thursday, with the Ministry of Tourism and Sports asserting that mobile homes are not buildings but mobile units for temporary accommodation that can be placed 25 meters from the shore, said Minister Tonči Glavina on Tuesday ahead of the Croatian Camping Congress. He emphasized that his Ministry has taken a definitive stance that mobile homes are not buildings, but mobile units for temporary accommodation that can be located within 25 meters of the coastline. However, on the other hand, according to responses from public consultations, the Ministry of Spatial Planning, Construction, and State Property continues to maintain that mobile homes are buildings, citing a ruling from the High Administrative Court from 2021, which determined that a mobile home is a building.

The question is whether Prime Minister Andrej Plenković will side with Minister of Spatial Planning, Construction, and State Property Branko Bačić, who has already partially yielded to hoteliers regarding the subdivision in tourist zones and whose ministry insists that a mobile home is a building, or with Minister Glavina.

On this occasion, the Minister of Tourism also stated that all camps that do not comply with the new laws and regulations will be given a ten-year period to adapt to the legal and sub-legal acts concerning what constitutes a mobile home and where it can be located.

– Until now, under the guise of mobile homes and in the area we need to protect the most, we have had some prefabricated buildings because legal vacuums were exploited – said Glavina.

He expressed satisfaction with this year’s results in the camping sector, especially in September. The Director of the Croatian Tourist Board, Kristjan Staničić, also expressed satisfaction, stating that camping is one of the most important industries in the overall tourist offer in Croatia. The Director of the Croatian Tourism Association, Veljko Ostojić, emphasized that national tourism professional associations strongly support precise legislative regulation of the term mobile home as movable equipment for camping in camps.

– Camps are guardians of space, not a problem, and that is the case everywhere in the world – says Ostojić.

He also recalled 12 court rulings, eight of which are from 2024, stating that mobile homes in camps are movable equipment for camping, meaning there is a distinction between the placement of mobile homes in camps and outside of them. The regulation of the number and arrangement of mobile homes should remain under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Tourism, while the Spatial Planning Act should only regulate fixed buildings (receptions, sanitary facilities, restaurants, etc.) and refer to tourism regulations, Ostojić believes.

In Croatian camps, about 15,700 mobile homes have been installed, of which nearly a third are located within 100 meters of the coastline.

– The camping sector accounts for as much as 23 percent of overnight stays in total tourism in Croatia, significantly contributes to economic development, and is an example of green business and sustainability. Our camps are among the best in Europe, and ADAC ranks Croatia highly in second place for camping quality. Such a proposal significantly undermines the competitiveness of Croatian camps compared to the competition and will have far-reaching consequences for the entire sector, with a real threat that the quality of camps will revert to the state it was in 30 years ago – said Adriano Palman, Director of the Camping Association of Croatia.