The Canarian Trade Union Federation (FSC) has warned that high rental prices in towns around tourist areas in the south of Tenerife, such as Las Galletas, Costa del Silencio, Palm-Mar, Los Cristianos, Las Americas, Playa Paraiso, and Callao Salvaje, are forcing people to leave the Island as they are simply too expensive.
This situation is now starting to spread further afield into San Isidro, El Fraile, Guargacho, Guaza, Cabo Blanco, Valle San Lorenzo and Armeñime, many of the towns where workers in the tourism and hospitality industry in the south live.
Manuel Fitas, the Secretary of FSC, said yesterday (Thursday): "For various reasons, property owners have decided to convert their apartments into holiday homes, making it increasingly common to find workers now living in motorhomes or sleeping in vans.”
He added: “This explosion of holiday homes is not only generating unaffordable prices for workers but is also causing the rejection of residents from residential areas, as more and holiday homes are appearing, legally or illegally, on residential complexes.”
The application for VV licences has increased massively since the government announced the draft law for the regulation and limitation of holiday homes. Given this, Fitas warns of the risk of a wave of ‘tourismphobia’, which he says is “very dangerous” for the Canary Islands, because, whether we like it or not, tourism is and will continue to be the engine of our economy.
According to the FSC, the stress of the situation is directly contributing to greater absenteeism from work, which is between 15% and 20% and which, in the case of housekeepers in hotels, rises to 30%.
“Both employers and public administrations must analyse the real reasons why the Canary Islands have 167,468 people registered as unemployed when jobs are easy to come by. Businesses are desperately trying to fill positions they need to maintain their activity, but work in the tourism and hospitality sector has stopped being attractive.”
After demanding more inspectors for holiday homes (there are only 35 in the entire Archipelago), the Canarian Trade Union Federation also demands that the government establish a moratorium on new VV licenses and introduce tax incentives for property owners to encourage long-term residential rentals
At the same time, they criticised the “inaction” of public administrations for not making more affordable social housing available in these areas.
