The government group of Tinajo "turned its back again this Wednesday on the problems of its neighbors", rejecting a motion with nine proposals that were aimed at helping families, companies, freelancers and sectors that are suffering the consequences of the economic crisis generated by Covid-19. “The mayor has not announced any measures that he is going to apply to help those affected, and he is not even capable of taking into account the proposals of the opposition”, lamented the president and councilor of the Renovating Movement of Tinajo, Antonio Morales, who recalls that "faced with the passivity of the government group", his party "has been proposing measures for months."
In fact, he already took this same motion to the last Plenary held last August, although he then agreed to leave it on the table, "given the commitment of the government group to hold a meeting to bring a consensus proposal to the next session."
“The mayor promised to see us before the next Plenary, but finally he did not call any meeting and when we raised it again, it seemed that the motion was new to him”, Morales criticized, who regrets that in two months the government group has not had time to study it. “They hadn't even read it”, he denounces.
Finally, after more than an hour of debate in the Plenary, what Jesús Machín offered was to eliminate most of the points, emptying the motion of meaning and leaving many sectors unprotected. “I told him that from the Renovating Movement we refused, because we consider that all the measures we propose there are necessary and many more”, explained Antonio Morales.
Measures rejected by Jesús Machín
The measures against which the government group voted included waiving tax obligations for companies in the municipality that have been affected by the crisis, as well as helping the most affected families in employment plans. In addition, the MRT motion requested a specific employment plan for young people, who have been severely affected by the crisis. For them, the motion also called for the implementation of a vocational guidance and training plan.
In addition, the party demanded the approval “immediately” of the General Plan of the municipality, adapting it to current regulations, "as an engine to boost the economy and attract potential investors who want to carry out projects in the municipality."
Finally, it proposed the creation of a specific plan to help the primary sector, which included training and advice to improve professionalization and also marketing tools, “to highlight the product”. In addition, it asked to promote different lines of aid from the City Council, facilitating farmers' access to the material they need to carry out interventions on their farms.
“For Jesús Machín and his government group, it seems that none of these things are important, because not only have they rejected the motion, but they have not even been able to meet to debate it, when our party offered a hand for it more than two months ago”, laments Antonio Morales.
A motion approved unanimously and two requests
Regarding the other motion that the Renovating Movement of Tinajo defended in the Plenary this Wednesday, it did manage to go ahead unanimously. With it, he snatched from the government group the commitment to coordinate with the rest of the institutions -city councils, Cabildo and Government of the Canary Islands- and with the security forces to adopt measures in the face of the increase in crime, especially in relation to robberies on farms.
The motion also includes the development of a social awareness campaign aimed at protecting and enhancing the value of local products. “They are stealing agricultural products on farms and then taking them to stores and selling them there, and people buy the product without knowing where it comes from”, warns Antonio Morales,
Therefore, the objective of this campaign will be “to prevent businesses from continuing to buy products without knowing what the origin is and without having traceability”, and also “that people keep in mind that they have to know what product they are buying and where it comes from”.
In addition, already in the point of requests and questions, the Renovating Movement of Tinajo launched a petition for public administrations, and in particular the Tourist Centers, to pay a “reasonable and dignified” price for the local product of Lanzarote. In this regard, Antonio Morales explains that "the Centers have taken an average of prices of the island's products that is well below even what distributors are currently paying farmers." “If they lower the price more than what the distributors were paying, the sector's days are numbered”, warns the councilman.
Finally, the Renovating Movement of Tinajo raised another request related to the Coordination Table established between the Cabildo and the seven city councils as a result of the Covid-19 crisis, since it considers that some of the measures they are adopting do not make sense. In the case of sports activities, he points out that they have been authorized again but not all of them, with the added circumstance that in certain modalities the activity of the youth and regional categories is allowed, but not in cadet or children's categories. In addition, others such as rallies continue "without being authorized, despite the economy they generate around them."
“The request that we have made to the government group is that it claims that in that Table any sporting activity or modality be allowed to be held, whatever the category and whatever the modality, obviously with sanitary measures”, explains Antonio Morales, who stresses that “it is not understood” what criteria they have used to allow some and not others.
