PP and Vox have agreed that the regulatory development of the 'national priority' in the Comunitat Valenciana includes "the exclusion of access to structural social benefits and services for individuals who are in an irregular administrative situation, limiting their access exclusively to cases of vital urgency that proceed in accordance with the legal system."
This is one of the amendments that both groups presented this Friday afternoon to the accompanying law of the budgets of the Generalitat for 2026, which will be debated next Monday in committee in Les Corts. The plenary session the following Friday will presumably validate the accompanying law with the support of PP and Vox, who have already approved the regional accounts.
In one of the proposals signed by the spokespersons of PP and Vox, Nando Pastor and José Mª Llanos, it is established that "the Consell will approve the necessary regulatory provisions to develop the conditions for access to all aids, subsidies, and public benefits inspired by the principle of national priority, which seeks the priority allocation of public resources to those who maintain a real, lasting, and verifiable connection in the Comunitat Valenciana."
Thus, according to the agreement between both formations, the development regulations must foresee, "in any case," a "minimum reinforced period of connection, registration, and linkage to the territory; the linkage of access to aids, subsidies, and public benefits to the history of contributions, permanence, and contribution to the sustainability of the system" and, as a final element, "the exclusion of individuals in an irregular administrative situation" from the benefits and social services "of a structural nature."
In this same amendment, PP and Vox incorporate into Law 3/2019, on inclusive social services, as a general and transversal principle, that "the priority allocation of public resources will be sought for those who maintain a real, lasting, and verifiable connection," with the aim of "ensuring the effective and affective relationship of the applicant to the territory."
In another joint amendment, the two formations determine that access to the Valencian inclusion income "will be inspired by access to national priority," with the same objectives already mentioned.
Minimum residence periods and changes in services
According to the details, "the requirement of habitual residence will be considered fulfilled when the registration in any Valencian municipality is recorded" during one of these two minimum periods: "three years continuously immediately prior to the date of application" or "ten years within the 30 immediately prior to the application, continuously or interrupted".
In the educational field, the groups establish that school cafeterias must "guarantee equality" in the food offered to students, "unless alternatives must be offered for medical reasons".
Limitation on the use of burka or niqab and obligations of public employees
On the other hand, PP and Vox include among the obligations of civil servants "to keep the face substantially uncovered throughout the workday and public attention, not allowing the wearing of garments or accessories that substantially conceal it" and excepting cases of medical-sanitary prescription or labor risk regulations. They classify non-compliance with this obligation as a serious offense.
In coherence with this approach, they incorporate "as an objective reason for denial of access and permanence" in public establishments to those who wear "garments or accessories that substantially conceal the face, preventing visual identification or facial recognition".
Reaction from Compromís and announcement of appeal
After these amendments became known, the spokesperson for Compromís, Joan Baldoví, denounces that "once again we see how the PP kneels before Vox and they agree on measures that go against the most basic consensuses of society".
"The Valencians are not a racist or xenophobic people. We are a dignified and inclusive people. And we know that our problem is not with our neighbors who were born outside, but with the politicians of PP and Vox who plug in their friends and distribute public housing among their militants," he states in statements sent to the media.
For this reason, Baldoví advances that Compromís will promote a constitutional appeal against the accompanying law "and all the cuts to rights agreed upon by PP and Vox".
Criticism from PSPV and accusations of institutional racism
For his part, the PSPV syndic, José Muñoz, considers that these amendments represent "a new step in the racist and xenophobic drift against migrant people in the Comunitat Valenciana" because PP and Vox intend to "extend the so-called 'national priority', the institutionalized apartheid, to the rest of the legal framework of the Comunitat Valenciana and, specifically, to social laws, turning a person's origin into a criterion to decide who has more rights and who has less." "This is called discrimination and institutionalized cruelty," he emphasizes in a statement.
"The aberration reaches the extreme that, through the amendments, the Consell is tasked with developing regulatory measures for the principle of national priority, that is, to draft the Regulation of Institutionalized Racism in the Generalitat. It is repugnant," he denounces, and warns that "the weakness of Pérez Llorca and his continuous concessions to the far-right are turning the Comunitat Valenciana into a laboratory of inhumanity": "Every time the PP concedes to Vox, the far-right advances, and every time Pérez Llorca adopts their postulates, racism ceases to be a marginal discourse to become government policy."
Muñoz maintains that both formations "are targeting migrant people and using their rights as bargaining chips to remain in power." And he warns the PP that "it is allowing something that is especially serious: to normalize racism. They want to turn discrimination into law, to dress exclusion in legality. It is a deeply inhumane and dangerous drift, it is breaking the basic principle of equality."
After claiming that "the Comunitat Valenciana cannot become the testing ground for the far-right, nor the place where a weak president allows racism to become the norm," he insists that "Llorca must choose: either he defends equality and the rights of all people, or he continues kneeling before Vox and assumes full responsibility for turning discrimination into public policy."