Who is calling the 19 September protest?

In Arrecife, CCOO, at 11 a.m. outside the town hall (La Voz de Lanzarote, 9 September 2026). For Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Europa Press and the Canary media name no organiser, only the workers themselves.

Is travel time between two homes paid?

Under article 30.5.A of the Canary collective agreement (gazette no. 2 of 3 January 2023) it counts as working time between consecutive calls; article 33.J provides 0.20 euros a kilometre for use of the worker's own vehicle.

What does a care assistant earn under the agreement?

The 2025 table in annex II gives a basic salary of 1,201.52 euros a month. The agreement expired on 31 December 2025 and rolls over in the absence of notice.

Who is responsible — municipality, island or government?

Article 20(g) of Ley 16/2019 lists it as a service in kind. The municipalities run their own; since 2023 the regional government has funded the specialised service through framework agreements and in 2025 tendered it itself for four islands, while the island councils allocate places.

CANARY ISLANDS · LABOUR

1,447 home-help services for the whole of the Canaries — why the march is on 19 September

On 19 September the women who deliver home care take to the streets of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the Canary leg of a nationwide day of protest. How small the service at issue is can be read in the Imserso statistics: at 31 August 2026 the islands recorded 1,447 home-help services, 1.5 per cent of all 95,191 Canary dependency benefits — the Spanish average is 16.2 per cent. At the same time 16,986 people on the islands held a cash benefit with which they are expected to buy that very service privately.

13 September 2026 · By Martin Kosinski · 4 min

A street in Santa Cruz de Tenerife (illustrative)

Photo: Flocci Nivis, CC BY 4.0 (illustrative image).

The call and the figures

Europa Press / Canarias Ahora, 12 September 2026: rally on 19 September in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, part of a nationwide day of protest also in Valencia, Madrid, Barcelona, Zaragoza and Seville.
La Voz de Lanzarote and Crónicas de Lanzarote, 9 September 2026: in Arrecife the union CCOO calls a protest for the same day at 11 a.m. outside the town hall.
Imserso, SAAD statistics at 31 August 2026: 1,447 home-help services in the Canaries out of 414,984 in Spain — 0.35 per cent, while the islands account for 3.72 per cent of all dependency benefits. 16,986 Canary cash benefits are tied to the same service.
I Collective Agreement for the Canary home-help sector, gazette no. 2 of 3 January 2023: basic pay for a care assistant under the 2025 table is 1,201.52 euros a month; travel time between consecutive calls counts as working time under article 30.5.A, own-vehicle use is paid at 0.20 euros a kilometre under article 33.J.
Gobierno de Canarias, 23 June 2025: the hourly cost of the service rises from 14 to 22 euros; president Fernando Clavijo puts the state's share of the funding at 22 per cent instead of the 50 per cent prescribed.

Who is calling it — and who is not named

For Arrecife the convener is clear: CCOO, according to La Voz de Lanzarote and Crónicas de Lanzarote of 9 September 2026, calls people to the town hall at 11 a.m., for proper contracts and rosters, against the bolsa de horas, for retirement at 60 and recognition of occupational illness.

For Santa Cruz de Tenerife it is not. The Europa Press report of 12 September 2026 and its versions in Canarias Ahora, Diario de Avisos and Moncloa name neither union nor platform, only the workers themselves; no named organiser could be established, and no place or time had been published up to 13 September. Behind the national call stands a win in parliament: according to the initiative register Control Congreso, the Social Rights and Consumer Affairs Committee adopted a motion of the Grupo Parlamentario Republicano on 26 May 2026, whose final text of 10 June 2026 runs to 17 points. It does not bind the government. The workers want to carry it into the Senate and into the announced reform of the dependency law.

A service the municipalities owe and companies deliver

Article 20(g) of Ley 16/2019 lists home help as a service in kind; as a rule it is delivered by companies that have won a tender. Two strands run side by side in the Canaries. The municipalities operate their own home help; in addition, according to a Gobierno de Canarias statement of 18 December 2023, the social affairs department signed a framework agreement worth seven million euros with the town halls for the specialised service — consejera Candelaria Delgado justified it by pointing out that for many people with a recognised grade and a finished care plan there was no provider at all. In February 2024 the government reported 24 of 88 municipalities. The second strand it tenders itself: on 21 July 2025 the Consejo de Gobierno authorised 17 million euros for Fuerteventura, Lanzarote, La Gomera and Tenerife.

In Santa Cruz de Tenerife, according to Atlántico Hoy of 17 May 2026, the city paid six million euros in arrears to the company Atende, whose contract had run on without a new tender since November 2024. Since mid-May 2026 there is also, Diario de Avisos reported, an allowance of about 22 euros an hour, capped at three hours a day; the city counted around 1,400 users, and Canarias Ahora reported more than 300 staff on 6 May 2026.

The agreement — and the journeys between homes

The sector is covered by the I Collective Agreement for the Canary home-help sector (gazette no. 2 of 3 January 2023), concluded between the employers' association ASADE and CCOO, UGT and Intersindical Canaria. It ran to 31 December 2025 and, absent notice, rolls over. The 2025 table gives the care assistant 1,201.52 euros basic salary a month, the lowest step in the agreement. Part-time work must amount to at least 25 hours a week, or at least eight where the nature of the service requires it; article 30.5.G.1 itself speaks of a "high proportion of part-time contracts".

On the point at the centre of the national protest the Canary text differs: article 30.5.A expressly makes "those hours spent travelling between services performed consecutively" working time as well, and article 33.J obliges the company to cover travel costs, at 0.20 euros a kilometre for the worker's own vehicle. On paper the central demand is met here; the dispute is about application. Intersindical Canaria, with USO and CCOO, reported the agreement to the labour inspectorate in October 2025, according to Diario de Avisos.

The other end: 1,447 services, 16,986 vouchers

Of 95,191 dependency benefits in the Canaries at 31 August 2026, Imserso data show 1,447 to be home help: 555 at grade III, 457 at grade II, 435 at grade I. Money is granted instead. 29,123 Canary benefits are prestaciones vinculadas al servicio, a subsidy towards buying a service the administration does not supply; 16,986 of them are tied to home help. Across Spain the ratio is the other way round: 70,345 such subsidies against 414,984 services actually delivered.

Those who do get the service are not served sparingly: 30.4 hours a month at grade I, 57.2 at grade II, 81.8 at grade III, well above the Spanish averages of 19.9, 44.0 and 65.7 and in the upper half of the bands in annex II of Real Decreto 1051/2013 as amended by Real Decreto 675/2023. The Canary problem is not the hours but the number of households reached at all — and the 22 euros an hour is the price paid to the company, not the wage of the woman who rings the bell.

If you hold a cash benefit for home help. The prestación vinculada al servicio is not a carer's allowance for relatives but an earmarked subsidy towards buying the service from an authorised provider — in the Canaries an average of 264.59 to 613.21 euros a month depending on grade (Imserso, 31 August 2026). Anyone who would rather have the service itself applies through the social services of their municipality of residence.

What remains open. For the rally in Santa Cruz de Tenerife neither an organiser nor a place and time could be established; only the CCOO call for Arrecife is documented. How many people work in home help in the Canaries, how large the part-time share is and how many companies hold the service are published by no authority; all that is known is the more than 300 staff in Santa Cruz de Tenerife. The often quoted figure of some 150,000 workers, 97 per cent of them women (Tercera Información, 27 May 2026), is a national figure. ASADE and the municipalities had not commented up to 13 September.

FAQ

Who is calling the 19 September protest?: In Arrecife, CCOO, at 11 a.m. outside the town hall (La Voz de Lanzarote, 9 September 2026). For Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Europa Press and the Canary media name no organiser, only the workers themselves.
Is travel time between two homes paid?: Under article 30.5.A of the Canary collective agreement (gazette no. 2 of 3 January 2023) it counts as working time between consecutive calls; article 33.J provides 0.20 euros a kilometre for use of the worker's own vehicle.
What does a care assistant earn under the agreement?: The 2025 table in annex II gives a basic salary of 1,201.52 euros a month. The agreement expired on 31 December 2025 and rolls over in the absence of notice.
How many people in the Canaries receive home help?: At 31 August 2026 the Imserso recorded 1,447 home-help services, 1.5 per cent of all 95,191 Canary dependency benefits; a further 16,986 benefits are cash to buy the same service.
Who is responsible — municipality, island or government?: Article 20(g) of Ley 16/2019 lists it as a service in kind. The municipalities run their own; since 2023 the regional government has funded the specialised service through framework agreements and in 2025 tendered it itself for four islands, while the island councils allocate places.

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