Canary Islands Parliament Rejects Vox's 'National Priority'

The Chamber votes against the far-right's proposal to prioritize Canarians in accessing public resources.

Generic image of a parliamentary chamber interior.
IA

Generic image of a parliamentary chamber interior.

The Parliament of the Canary Islands has voted against Vox's 'national priority' proposal, rejecting the idea of prioritizing Canarian residents over foreigners for public resources.

The regional Chamber has given a 'slam of the door' to the far-right's initiative, which sought to position foreigners as competitors to Canarians for public resources. Nationalist deputy Ana Oramas told Vox: "If you don't like this Canary Islands, as Braulio's song says: get out of here," referring to the rejected proposal.
The party led by Nicasio Galván presented the proposal as a response to the collapse of public services and the lack of resources for island families. However, the initiative found no support in the Canary Islands Parliament, not even from the People's Party, which has accepted the concept in other autonomous communities.
Popular Party deputy Jacob Qadri acknowledged the "dramatic situation in immigration" and that resources are "at the limit," but distinguished between "recognizing the problem" and "selling a headline like national priority." For the PP, the priority should be "all people" and, at the state level, "urgent early elections."
Vox argued that its "national priority" approach does not exclude anyone, but rather "prioritizes Canarians over foreigners." However, the Chamber did not share this framework. ASG deputy Jesús Ramos stated: "I don't believe in national priority, I believe in citizen priority."
Natalia Santana (NC) placed the debate in the context of public management and inequality, arguing that "national priority" does not solve problems but "feeds fear" and "pits victims against each other." Meanwhile, Ana Oramas (nationalist) proposed a "Canarian national priority" understood in an opposite sense, reclaiming "Canary Islands" as a nation and defining Canarians as "those who live in the Canary Islands, who love this land and want to put down their roots here."
Socialist Nira Fierro described Vox's "national priority" as "a euphemism" to "hide their racism" and criticized the PP for its double standard in accepting it in other communities while rejecting it in the Canary Islands. Fierro warned of a strategy of "social division" and "segregation by classism."