Spain's New Immigration Law Addresses Crisis of Unaccompanied Minors in the Canary Islands
This Tuesday, Spain's Council of Ministers approved a significant decree law aimed at revising the country's immigration policy in light of the alarming situation facing over 5,500 children and adolescents currently residing in the Canary Islands. This decisive move comes after repeated criticisms from organizations like Amnesty International regarding excessive punishments and inadequate inspections in the migrant minors' centers across the region.
The reform of Article 35 of the Immigration Law introduces a mandatory distribution system for unaccompanied migrant minors during emergencies, a situation that has been particularly pressing in regions like the Canary Islands and Ceuta. Minister of Territorial Policy, Ángel Víctor Torres, confirmed that this decree would facilitate parliamentary processing following negotiations with various political parties.
Months of discussions have finally culminated in a framework that not only modifies existing immigration law but also establishes a viable distribution system. This reform essentially allows autonomous communities to significantly increase their hosting capacities for unaccompanied minors, potentially tripling their current capabilities.
According to Minister Torres, the autonomous communities can adjust the criteria and requirements of the agreement through a Sectorial Conference, provided there is unanimous consensus. If any community increases its hosting capacity threefold, it can declare a state of migration contingency, which will trigger the activation of the new mechanisms outlined in the Royal Decree Law.
The government will determine how many minors each region must accommodate based on specific metrics, including population size, unemployment rates, and the historical capacity for hosting unaccompanied minors. Regional governments must submit relevant data regarding these criteria by the end of the month to ascertain the exact number of minors they can support. Currently, the government lacks updated figures and has been relying on projections to estimate the emergency distribution of approximately 4,400 minors from the Canary Islands and Ceuta.
Initial projections suggest that the Community of Madrid, Andalusia, and the Valencian Community will bear the brunt of this hosting burden, receiving 806, 795, and 478 minors respectively. In contrast, smaller receptions are expected in regions such as Catalonia, the Balearic Islands, and the Basque Country, projected to host only 27, 59, and 88 youths respectively.
Furthermore, the reform will include financial compensation for communities that are required to take in more minors than their share of the national average, addressing concerns about the strain on resources.
Earlier this year, the Minister of Childhood and the president of the Canary Islands had preliminarily agreed on criteria to guide this distribution, mirroring conditions from a similar agreement approved by all autonomous communities in 2022. These considerations emphasized equitable hosting based on population size and previous hosting efforts.
Another important context for this debate is the political landscape. In the summer of 2024, both the People's Party (PP) and Junts blocked a reform proposal intended to enforce a mandatory system for distributing minors rescued in the Canary Islands among autonomous communities. Minister Torres has expressed strong intentions to ensure that such setbacks do not recur in future discussions.
Despite the hopeful direction laid out by the new decree law, officials have indicated that the current facilities in the Canary Islands are stretched beyond their capacity to guarantee the fundamental rights of these vulnerable youth. With Needing to urgently respond to this humanitarian crisis, the Spanish government has taken a step forward, but ongoing challenges remain in ensuring these children receive the protection and support they desperately need.
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