The Governing Council of Canary Islands has approved an extraordinary contribution of 5.3 million euros to the public universities of the Canary Islands to guarantee the 2.5% salary increase for university staff, in compliance with Royal Decree-Law 14/2025, of December 2, which approves urgent measures regarding remuneration in the public sector.
The measure makes the increase effective retroactively, with economic effects from January 1 to December 31, 2025, in a context of state budget extension. The contribution approved by the regional Executive assumes the economic impact derived from a basic state-level regulation and prevents it from falling on the ordinary funding of public universities.
The Minister of Universities, Science, Innovation and Culture, Migdalia Machín, pointed out that "the Canary Islands Government's commitment to public universities is a structural investment in equality of opportunity and social development". She added that "reinforcing their role in generating knowledge and training qualified professionals is key to facing the economic and scientific challenges of the Canary Islands".
This extraordinary contribution is added to a sustained policy of strengthening university funding promoted by the Ministry headed by Machín. In the current fiscal year, the Universities area exceeds 300 million euros for the first time, the highest figure allocated to the public university system in the Canary Islands, with an increase of 10 million euros compared to the previous year.
In this context, the University of La Laguna and the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria have each received more than 5 million euros in additional funding compared to the previous year, reaching an accumulated increase of 30 million euros since 2023. This budgetary effort reinforces the financial stability of the public university system and allows for continued progress in teaching quality, digitalization, and research.