The national general secretary of Coalición Canaria, Fernando Clavijo, demanded today that the Government of Spain control the abusive fares on flights to the Peninsula. Likewise, he warned the State Government today that the focus on the "prohibitive" rise in prices of airline tickets "should be on the airlines, not the Canarians or the 75% discount for residents" included in the Economic and Fiscal Regime of the Canary Islands. He was so forceful in a press conference today in which the senator for the Autonomous Community demanded an investigation by the National Commission of Markets and Competition for a possible "price pact" between the airlines.
In this context, he warned of the "exorbitant prices of airline tickets" that limit mobility and "is causing a real problem for Canarians who want to return home this Christmas and who are seeing how they cannot due to the alarming increase in air fares."
The nationalist leader blamed the Government of Spain but also the Government of the Canary Islands "for standing idly by on a matter as important to the archipelago as this one." Clavijo assured that "it is not enough to say that it is being studied. How many study commissions do they need?" In the same way, he insisted on censuring that "every time this issue comes up, the issue is put in the spotlight of the 75% discount for Canarian residents as if we were criminals instead of looking for responsibilities in the airline operators," he stated.
The senator for the Autonomous Community went a step further and blamed the Government of the Canary Islands for the current situation. "In the last three and a half years they have not lifted a finger to avoid a price increase that is generating real mobility problems, which will prevent many Canarians from returning home this Christmas or from traveling to see their relatives in the Peninsula, to which we must add the damage to the tourism sector and the Canarian economy."
At this point, he added that "territorial cohesion is guaranteed not only with connectivity, which is now guaranteed if we take into account the frequencies, but with the control of fares, -to which he added- that work has not been done nor has it been demanded by the Government of the Canary Islands."
Fernando Clavijo stated that "that inaction, that lack of interest and that inability is paid for by the Canarians." And he advocated changing this reality "with planning, work and management." In this sense, he assured that today we would not have reached this situation if they had only done something of what the Governments of the Canary Islands, the Balearic Islands, Ceuta and Melilla announced in 2020 at the Summit held in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria to address the problem of the increase in prices after the entry into force of the 75% resident discount, which, he reproached, "remained in a photo op."
"Today, three years later, none of the conclusions of that Summit, which only served for the photo -he insisted- have been put into operation; today, three years later, Canarians have increasingly reduced their ability to move to any other point in the Peninsula and neither the Government of Spain nor that of the Canary Islands do anything to prevent it."
The candidate for the Presidency of the Canary Islands was also forceful and warned that "the Canary Islands are increasingly far from the Continent and both the State and the Canarian Executive are complicit in the abuse of power that the airlines are exercising."
Likewise, Fernando Clavijo insisted that none of the requests from the Summit of the Canary Islands, the Balearic Islands, Ceuta and Melilla have gone ahead. Neither the creation of a permanent State-extra-peninsular territories table to monitor and control, nor have Public Service Obligations been established for certain routes with the Peninsula, nor has the price of airline tickets been audited; nor have the studies on the increase in prices been made transparent, nor has the shared management of airports been allowed -also included in the Statute of Autonomy-; nor has the acquisition of Air Europa by the IAG Group been monitored, nor have the competent authorities been asked for fiscal or economic measures that may affect air connectivity with the extra-peninsular territories.
The leader of the Canarian nationalists highlighted the "seriousness of a situation in which the Governments of Spain and the Canary Islands are being accomplices." In this regard, he added that "it is perverse that the application of the 75% resident discount was intended to favor mobility, but what it is doing is enriching the airlines because Canarians are not paying the same as before its entry into force, it is that now they pay more to travel."
Rosa Dávila points out that "there are no alternatives" to the plane in the Canary Islands
For her part, the deputy of the Canarian Nationalist Group, Rosa Dávila, maintained that in the case of the Canary Islands "there is no alternative, the boat is not an alternative as it may be in the Balearic Islands, in Ceuta or Melilla." In this way, she recalled the demands of the Canarian nationalists both in the Courts and in the Canary Islands to demand from the control of the monopoly that Iberia and Air Europa are creating, to the co-management of the Canarian airports, to the control of abusive prices or the new PSO Canary Islands and Peninsula. "Until now the answer has always been no, which is denying mobility to the Canarians and putting obstacles to a tourism sector that continues to drag the impact of the pandemic and inflation," she concluded.
Dávila emphasized the situation of many Canarians. "It is impossible for Canarians who live abroad to return on special dates with these prices, nor can families meet" and warned that this also "transfers to the Canarian economy." The candidate for the presidency of the Cabildo de Tenerife also stated that "the Canary Islands are today further from the Peninsula" and warned that the increase in prices may cause "the fracture of the Canary Islands with the Continent" if the Governments of the Canary Islands and Spain do not act urgently.