Brits heading on a ferry to France to pick up beer, wine, and other treats may soon find themselves with an additional fee to pay.

This week, the French Senate backed plans to approve a cruise tax of €15 (approximately £13.10) per person at each port of call they make in France. The move is planned to raise an estimated £75 million in annual revenue, which will go towards coastal conservation. However, critics of the scheme have warned that the plans lack clarity, and the additional fee could end up being paid by people arriving by boat on popular routes such as the Dover to Calais ferry. 

The cruise tax falls under France’s new pollueur-payeu principle (polluter pays), which puts the emphasis on individuals who perform polluting activities to pay, rather than the burden falling on others.

Senator Jean-Marc Délia argued that the amendment “would re-establish fiscal and ecological fairness, shift responsibility onto polluters, and would enable us to sustainably finance the preservation of our coastlines”.

However, critics such as Amélie Montchalin, Minister of the Budget of France for the country’s centrist government, pointed out the “difficulty of differentiating between a cruise ship and a ferry.” She argued that the text did not clearly distinguish between cruise ships and ferries, France3 reports. She believes this situation could have consequences for ferries to Corsica or from across the Channel.

The bill still needs to pass through parliament and is subject to a vote, as part of ongoing debates around the 2026 budget. These are set to take place throughout next week. Amélie Montchalin’s objections could help prompt changes to the bill to ensure there’s clarity between ferries and cruises arriving in France. 

Cruise ships have become a contentious issue in France, with a number of restrictions and outright bans on boats in increasingly busy ports. From January 1, Cannes will ban all cruise ships of over 1,000 people, while Nice has capped the number of cruise ship arrivals to just 65 a year, although a bid to ban larger ships from docking at the port was overturned.

According to French news outlet Connexion, the Mayor of Nice, Christian Estrosi, previously complained that he “cannot stand seeing huge cruise ships in the bay of Villefranche, these massive floating buildings with their effects on overtourism [and] pollution”.

Many areas have also put restrictions on the vessels when they’re docked in port, requiring them to plug into the grid, rather than running their engines when moored. Locals have also highlighted the environmental harm caused by cruise ships, including pollution and disturbance to marine species. 

France is not the first country to crack down on cruises. Norway will be imposing strict emission regulations on cruise ships from next year, with a complete ban on fuel-powered cruise ships expected by 2032. Barcelona closed one of their cruise terminals in 2023, and plans to close another in 2026, limiting the number of passengers coming in at one time, while the island of Santorini began capping cruise arrivals to 8,000 a day this summer.

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