The Citizen Water Table has expressed in a press release its discomfort over the situation of the water supply in Lanzarote and La Graciosa. "At the beginning of 2025, the President of the Cabildo told us that that year was going to be the year of water, of great investments and great responses and solutions to the deficits and problems of water on the Island. Nothing could be further from the truth," they begin by saying.
Recently, the Counselor of the Government of the Canary Islands, Manuel Miranda, has been in Lanzarote, "who, proud of having increased water production, proclaimed that such a laudable achievement was the result of the "commitment of the autonomous and island governments to improving water supply" and the absurdity cannot be greater, nor can the triumphalist arrogance. Again announcing the same thing they have been saying for years and nothing has changed (the pipeline of La Graciosa, to which he also referred, serves as an example)", they criticize.
The Board denounces that "the fact is that they congratulate themselves on having increased water production by 12% since 2023", which is why they point out that "it is absurd to increase production if 56% of the water continues to go unfactured produced when, out of 7,800 cubic meters, and thanks to the “losses”, we overpay and waste the production of 3,700 cubic meters with the consequent environmental deterioration that this entails. Quite an achievement".
On the other hand, they assure that "it does not make the slightest allusion to the problem of discharges which offers such a good and innovative image to tourists visiting El Reducto, to give an example. We have a real problem with wastewater treatment plants and with discharges throughout the Island. On February 16, the Lanzarote Water Consortium was fined for wastewater discharges into the sea in Arrecife. A fine of 30,000 euros that the Supreme Court has ratified".
Furthermore, they accuse of "failing to tell the truth when they say that their effort consists of “reinforcing the integral water cycle and advancing in key infrastructures to guarantee supply in Lanzarote”, something impossible to carry out given what they have done so far, which has been nothing but entangling and remaining in errors and inaction: the northern pipeline remains paralyzed, works began in April 2021 and we are in April 2026. The La Graciosa pipeline is not yet installed when, that magnificent year for water in Lanzarote that was going to be 2025, they said it was already resolved".
Likewise, they state that "the collection of abusive bills and constant water cuts remains unresolved".
Finally, "they intend to carry out a linear increase in rates, that is, that it goes up the same for everyone, regardless of their situation and the type of water consumed, in other words, that it doesn't matter if it's domestic, tourist, etc."
"It is one more abuse of this mess they are getting us into and that we are going to pay for. We insist that the Prices Commission concluded that the tariff increase cannot be approved when the right to access water is not guaranteed with constant cuts and losses and the intolerable overcost in production; let us remember the opinion that
indicated the impropriety of transferring the cost to citizens due to the very high volume of water losses in the distribution network (which in Lanzarote exceed 56%).
It is understood that a management that allows more than half of the produced water to be lost cannot be rewarded with a tariff increase," they sentence.
Therefore, the Lanzarote Water Board refuses for tariffs to be raised and demands that the problems of the “loss” of 56% and periodic cuts be resolved.
"As long as they do not solve the problem of water for agriculture and the abusive collection of bills. As long as the shame of the spills is not resolved", they indicate.
"The problem is serious enough for them to speak to us clearly and without triumphalist propaganda typical of snake oil salesmen. Given what has been seen so far, we demand the direct management of the integral water cycle. Public water," they conclude.
