Humphrey CarterPalma14/01/2021 11:20
TW
1

One would have thought that Mallorca and the Balearics would have profited from the regional president, Francina Armengol, and her boss, the Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez, in Madrid being members of the same Socialist party, but it appears not. We have already witnessed the Balearics getting short changed yet again in the budget.

Despite the region being one of the largest contributors in Spain to Madrid’s coffers, the return is negligible and falls well short of what the region not only deserves but needs. Unlike many other autonomous regions, the Balearics, in a normal year, has to cope with a floating population which at times trebles the standing number of inhabitants and all the costs that go with it, but Madrid does its numbers, like all previous governments have done from both sides of the political fence, on the fixed population.

And, while the Balearics deficit continues to reach record levels, the region is now back of the queue with regards to the Covid vaccine. With Madrid, which is quite probably a political issue with the opposition Partido Popular in charge of the capital, the Balearics has the lowest vaccination rate in the country. Galicia, for example, has already used up 80 percent of its current allocation, here in the Balearics we are languishing at around 30 percent. Does not make selling the Balearics as a safe holiday destination easy.