The Spanish government denies the immigration contingency in the Balearic Islands

PalmThe Ministry of Youth and Children on Tuesday denied the Balearic Government's request for a migration contingency. In a resolution, it rejected the request because the number of unaccompanied foreign minors currently accommodated by the island councils does not triple the islands' regular capacity of 406 places. "According to the data provided by the community itself as of the date the request was reviewed, the total number of unaccompanied foreign minors accommodated is 694, insufficient to meet the legally established threshold for declaring a contingency situation," the government specified. To receive an affirmative response from the Ministry, the islands would have to accommodate 1,218 unaccompanied migrant minors.

President Marga Prohens reacted to the notification with indignation. In the government oversight session in Parliament, she lamented that on the day the archipelago surpassed the figure of "more than 5,000 people in an irregular situation" in 2025, the Spanish government denied their request. "The government's responsibility is to protect our borders, to act against mafias that traffic in human lives," Prohens denounced: "We need the immigration contingency, because the rest is undignified, racist, and inhumane."

She stated this in the oversight session in Parliament, after Vox spokesperson Manuela Cañadas asked her if she "is willing to move from words to actions on the issue of illegal immigration." The Balearic president expressed that she "will pursue all avenues at her disposal to stop this discriminatory distribution that favors other autonomous communities."

She avoids condemning the genocide in Gaza.

More and more Western institutions and organizations—including UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese—are defining Israel's attacks on the population of Gaza as genocide. Last Monday, Spanish President Pedro Sánchez, already used this term, after recalling the figures of 63,000 deaths, 159,000 injured, 250,000 people at risk of malnutrition and nearly two million displaced people. But Prohens has once again avoided condemning him. During the control session in the Parliament, she limited herself to "condemning any murder of anyone, regardless of who it comes from," and criticized that "Hamas, a terrorist group, congratulates the Sánchez government."

Prohens thus responded to the request from the leader of the PSIB (Socialist Party of Catalonia), Iago Negueruela, for her to speak out. "Thousands of dead, forced displacement, genocide, state your opinion clearly: why are you unable to condemn the extermination of Gaza?" he asked. However, the head of the Executive has redirected her response to the issue that has been the focus of her interventions in recent months: the wave of migration and the rejection of the distribution of unaccompanied minors from the Canary Islands, decreed by the Spanish government. "Do you condemn the failure to prosecute mafias, or the pull-effect policies, the fact that the Spanish government does nothing to stop the deaths in the Balearic Islands?" he replied.

Fernández speaks of a "pull effect" in aid.

For her part, the Minister for Families, Social Welfare, and Care for the Long-Term, Sandra Fernández, who replaced Catalina Cirer last July, made her debut in Parliament, confirming the government's alignment with Vox's position. Responding to a question from far-right party MP Sergio Rodríguez, Fernández stated that there is a "pull-in effect" on immigrants due to the management of "some aid" that, in her opinion, "generates a false perception of social coverage for all those arriving" in the Canary Islands.

In the government oversight session, he stated that he has an "obligation not to contribute" to the migratory emergency situation in the Islands and, therefore, the PP agreed with Vox to make the Guaranteed Social Income for new recipients conditional on proving three years of residency. "When we talk about social resources, we must be especially rigorous, because every euro wasted is a euro that won't be allocated to the most vulnerable people, and unfortunately, we have inherited a situation from left-wing governments that forces us to put order in many of these benefits, so that they go to the people who really need them," he stressed.

In the same vein, he denied the left's accusations of racism and xenophobia. "Racists are those who, with the most absolute demagoguery and the greatest cynicism, dismantle immigration services, preventing many people from regularizing their status, denying us immigration contingency, and failing to fight against the mafias that exploit people," he argued.

For his part, Rodríguez called for the elimination of aid to migrants because, in his opinion, it creates a pull effect. "It's an act of responsibility and humanity to stop the trafficking carried out by these mafias, the slave traders of the 21st century," he said. "These people must arrive cleanly and in dignified conditions."