The 5% for Education Platform has denounced that the Canary Islands budgets for 2027 take the Canary Islands further away from the objective of investing 5% of its Gross Domestic Product in education and places it at the worst figure in the last decade.
Thus, this platform has warned that for next year, investment in education will be 3.82%, a figure lower than the current 4.07% and "much further away" from the 4.63% reached in the last public accounts of the previous legislature.
All of this is deduced from the data offered by the Medium-Term Budgetary Plan and the Multiannual Budgetary Scenarios 2027-2029 of the Government of the Canary Islands, as reported by the 5% for Education Platform, which has denounced "an unprecedented setback in public educational investment".
The Budgetary Plan, approved on April 24, 2026, and published in the Official Gazette of the Canary Islands no. 91 of May 13, 2026, forecasts for 2027 a GDP of 66,880 million euros, with an interannual variation of 2.23%. However, total consolidated expenses stand at 12,877 million euros, with a negative interannual variation of 2.23%.
An investment of 2,554 million
The specific figure for education spending does not appear broken down in the Plan, indicated the Platform, which added that by applying the overall spending reduction rate to specific education spending, it is deduced that investment in this sector will also be cut by 2.23%, standing at around 2,554 million euros.
In other words, "GDP increases, but this is not reflected in an improvement in educational investment," it continued.
On the contrary, in 2027, investment in education as a percentage of GDP will be around 0.25 percentage points less than the current year. Furthermore, considering that the previous legislature ended with an investment of 4.63% of GDP, the current legislature has been characterized by a large initial decrease that has consolidated over time: 4.20% of GDP in 2024, 4.05% in 2025, 4.07% in 2026, and for 2027, 3.82%. The Government of the Canary Islands will close the legislature with the greatest setback in education investment in a decade.
For the Platform, these figures show "a devastating conclusion": investment in education would remain, at that 3.82% of GDP, increasingly far from the 5% established by the Canary Islands Education Law of 2014. The accumulated financing deficit would reach 790 million euros.
Tax cuts and public revenue cuts
It is foreseeable that this cut will be justified by alleging the need for budgetary stability, compliance with the spending rule, or the new framework for economic governance of the European Union. The Platform considers these to be excuses. The new European framework requires budgetary balance, not cuts in education. The Canary Islands already have the highest rate of tax reductions in the entire State, and it intends to expand it irresponsibly, which means a cut in public revenue and artificially limits spending on essential services such as education.
Thus, it has indicated that "this new non-compliance with Canary Law will worsen the situation of our educational system, which presents numerous problems and deficits". Among them, they have pointed to early school leaving, already at 15.9%; an even greater setback in early childhood education for 0 to 3 year olds, where the Canary Islands continue to be at the bottom of the State; a deficit of 4,000 teachers; significant difficulties in adequately addressing diversity and compensating for inequalities of origin; a cut in the public offering of Vocational Training, and Basic Vocational Training; and the lack of rehabilitation and replacement of obsolete educational infrastructure. Each year of non-compliance with the 5% condemns a generation of Canarians to lower educational quality, greater job insecurity, and fewer life opportunities.
Requests a minimum increase of 250 million
The Platform has demanded that the Government rectify the Budgetary Plan so that educational spending "returns to the path of reaching 5% of GDP within a reasonable timeframe". To achieve this, it would be necessary to have "a minimum increase of 250 million euros in the next Budget of the Canary Community for 2027".
Therefore, it has called on the educational community, the entire Canary society, and the parties in Parliament to reject this cut and to demand that "education cease to be used as an adjustment variable." "Education is a fundamental right, not an adjustable expense. Canary society cannot continue to wait," they concluded.
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