Eight out of ten self-employed workers in the Canary Islands consider it a priority to implement family reconciliation measures, according to the barometer presented this Tuesday by the regional government, which has announced a set of specific initiatives to facilitate the compatibility between the professional and personal lives of this group.
The Vice President of the Canary Islands Government, Manuel Domínguez, and the Secretary General of ATA in the islands, Elliot Martín, announced this Tuesday the data from the second barometer of self-employed workers in the autonomous community, which provides an analysis of their current situation.
The vice president has pointed out that the actions related to work-life balance respond to the main demands detected in the study and that their objective is "to respond to one of the greatest weaknesses of self-employment: the difficulty in achieving work-life balance".
The Government's plan includes **three distinct lines of aid**, the **first** of which allows the self-employed worker to **hire someone to take on childcare or dependent care tasks**
The second offers financial aid for external services, such as daycare or home care, and the third foresees support for the temporary replacement of the self-employed when they must be absent due to illness, maternity, paternity, or family care.
“For years we have heard self-employed workers say they cannot take sick leave. These measures aim to address that reality and recognize the burden self-employed individuals assume,” stated the vice president, who emphasized that the Canary Islands government wanted to “listen first and act later” regarding the sector's needs.
The general secretary of ATA also highlighted that the Canary Islands are currently the first autonomous community where a self-employed person can unsubscribe without paying Social Security contributions, a "pioneering" measure that, according to the vice president, "places the islands at the forefront of support for work-life balance".
The barometer, compiled with data from the Employment Observatory and the Canary Islands Government itself, also reveals that 47% of new self-employed individuals are women, confirming the growing trend of female entrepreneurship in the archipelago.
In total, 83% of self-employed workers have no employees, and the **fastest-growing sectors** correspond to professional, creative, technological, and scientific activities
In relation to the economic situation, the study shows that three out of four self-employed individuals consider a reduction in tax pressure to be necessary, while two out of three identify access to financing as their main obstacle.
The vice president has insisted that the Executive's objective is to "strengthen the sustainability of self-employment and diversify the Canary Islands' economy," for which new support measures will be incorporated for digitalization and the hiring of the first worker, especially in the case of those over 52 years of age, whose contribution cost will be borne by the regional government.
