The austerity-based 23% rate, that restaurateurs and cafe owners claim led to the loss of tens of thousands of jobs, is partially over with meals now attracting 13% VAT on mainland Portugal.
Some drink types, however, will still attract VAT at the top rate of 23%.
A 74-year-old woman died at 12:15 today after suffered a heart attack on the beach at Olhos de Água, Albufeira. She had just got out of the water after bathing.
Despite resuscitation efforts by lifeguards and subsequently by INEM paramedics and the Maritime Police, she was pronounced dead at the scene.
Germany was hit by a sharp rise last year in political extremist violence.
The country’s domestic intelligence agency reported that radial groups of the far right, far left and Islamist all gained members.
Spain’s acting prime minister said on Wednesday that Spain is opposed to any EU discussion with Scotland after the referendum result.
"The Spanish government is opposed to any negotiations with anyone else but the British government," Mariano Rajoy said.
Hefty fines have been handed out in Italy for labelling inferior olive oil as “extra virgin”.
Discount grocer Lidl was fined €550,000 by Italy’s antitrust authority. Lidl’s Primadonna brand was reported to have been labelled incorrectly.
A meeting between airport workers’ unions and Minister Pedro Marqeus has resulted in an impasse so a planned strike affecting the country's airports is going ahead this weekend, July 2nd and 3rd.
The strike will affect all of Portugal’s airports and represents a failure by management and the government successfully to deal with the grievances raised by union leaders that are complaining that Ryanair’s new baggage handling company Groundlink is operating fraudulently and fails to respect legislation covering working practices.
Ryanair’s boss Michael O’Leary has said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal that the decision in Britain to leave the European Union has caused concern over weaker airfares and has raised questions at Ryanair holdings over continued investment in the UK.
O’Leary confirmed that Ryanair is committed to buying a further 50 aircraft next year and it is now “highly unlikely” that these will be based in the UK, preferring other European bases.
Early reports from the Accident Investigation team as to the cause of the Alentejo air crash on June 19th, which killed the Belgian pilot and injured four of the seven skydivers onboard, indicate the structure of the aeroplane simply disintegrated in mid-air.
Three of the parachutists were unconscious when they fell from the Pilatus PC6 at around 7,000 feet but were saved by their parachutes which automatically opened due to a fail-safe barometric trigger.
