This Europe: Please adjust your undress before you shop in our resort
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Your support makes all the difference.On French beaches, anything goes, even next to nothing at all.
But the mayor of one seaside town insists holidaymakers must get dressed when they leave the beach this summer.
Henri Dunoyer, the right-wing mayor of La Grande-Motte, near Montpellier, says he and his citizens are fed up with rubbing shoulders with near-nude shoppers and strollers in the town's streets.
"It's not acceptable that tourists, naked to the waist, crush into shops at the busiest times and give everyone else, in a state of promiscuous proximity, the opportunity to sniff their sweat or the remains of their sun-cream," Mr Dunoyer said.
He has declared a by-law that bans people in beach attire from the town's shops or streets.
If the law is approved by the local prefect (senior, national government administrator), visitors to La Grande Motte face a €40 (£26) fine if they display a navel or nipple away from the beach or promenade from the end of this month.
The restrictions are being applied on an advisory basis from this week and visitors are already complaining at what they see as a curb on civil liberties.
"I can understand why you have to dress up to go into a shop," said Patrick, walking down the street in his swimming trunks. "But banning swimsuits in the streets is a bit much."
His wife, Sylvie, said: "We only have a short holiday and we want to profit from the sun as much as we can, in complete freedom. This is all very restrictive."
But tourists have no vote in La Grande-Motte elections, and the mayor has the townspeople on his side. "In some shops, you see women in bathing costumes which leave their buttocks hanging in the air," one female shop assistant said.
Alian Meiffre, who has a newspaper and tobacco shop, said: "Most shopkeepers agree with this law. People sometimes come in here straight out of the sea, dripping wet."
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