The deputy for Lanzarote and La Graciosa and insular president of Nueva Canarias-Bloque Canarista (NC-bc), Yoné Caraballo, has presented a proposal for improvement to the General Budget of the Canary Islands for 2026 aimed at reinforcing the resources allocated to Lanzarote through the restructuring of more than 20 million euros. His approach seeks to direct these funds towards priority areas such as Primary Care, nursery schools, environmental regeneration, and public transport.
Caraballo frames his proposal within the need to correct the initial draft presented by the Canary Islands Government for the island of Lanzarote, which, he denounces, is "inflated" with more than 50 million euros from European MRR funds, despite the fact that these resources do not have real execution possibilities. The deputy believes that this situation generates an unrealistic investment figure and creates expectations that cannot be met, which necessitates a responsible review adjusted to the island's reality.
In contrast, Caraballo's proposal seeks to intelligently reorganize the budget, without increasing total spending, but rather reallocating funds to respond to the most urgent needs of the citizenry. In the healthcare sector, Caraballo is committed to strengthening Primary Care, improving infrastructure such as the Health Centers in Mala, Puerto del Carmen, and Playa Blanca, and new facilities like the Health Centers in Argana Alta and Playa Honda, all with the aim of reducing the saturation of existing health centers and providing residents with a better range of services.Likewise, it advocates for a decisive push for the creation and expansion of public early childhood education centers for ages 0 to 3, such as the one in Puerto del Carmen, to advance work-life balance and guarantee equal opportunities from the earliest years of life
Another aspect that NC-bc has worked to improve is public housing. For the Canaristas, after an initial draft that cut 18 million for housing in Lanzarote, reducing it from 23 to 5 million, these allocations have been reinforced with the objective of planning, in the short and medium term, a public housing stock that covers the high demand and curbs the existing housing crisis.
The deputy also proposes reinforcing environmental regeneration projects, essential for protecting the natural spaces of an island subjected to a growing ecological footprint. Thus, he incorporates the need for a budget allocation for a regeneration and conservation project for the Haría Palm Grove.
In terms of mobility, it advocates for modernizing island public transport with the construction of a Bus Interchange in Argana Alta to increase frequencies and improve connectivity between municipalities and promote more sustainable and accessible alternatives to private carsCaraballo insists that his intention is for Lanzarote's 2026 budget to be "honest, realistic, and useful for the citizens," and that the people of Lanzarote receive "the resources they are entitled to without accounting tricks or impossible-to-execute allocations." He adds that a balanced and well-planned distribution will allow them to face the social, environmental, and mobility challenges that directly affect the island for the coming decades with guarantees.