The spokesperson for eco-sovereignist party MÉS per Palma, Neus Truyol, has warned that ‘the January slump will last throughout 2026’, due to the continued rise in the price of grocery shopping and the increase in rental prices, which ‘are causing material and emotional distress among working families in the city’.
Truyol made this statement on Tuesday in a press release, in which she went on to warn that ‘this causes stress, anxiety and difficulties in the educational performance of children and young people’.
For this reason, MÉS per Palma will present a motion at the next municipal plenary session to ask the City Council to promote measures to prevent the rise in the cost of living.
‘When a family has to choose between filling the fridge or paying the rent, the problem is not individual: it is political. The mayor cannot remain impassive in the face of this drama,’ she stressed.
The spokesperson for MÉS per Palma referred to the fact that in 2026, thousands of rental contracts signed during the pandemic, which were made at lower prices than the current ones, will expire. Specifically, she commented that in the Balearics, it is estimated that some 24,500 will expire, according to the Ministry of Social Rights, Consumption and Agenda 2030.
Palma accounts for around 60 per cent of rental demand, which, according to Truyol, means that between 14,500 and 15,000 rental contracts will expire in the city in 2026. This situation therefore puts between 30,000 and 40,000 people at risk of becoming homeless, according to the spokesperson for MÉS per Palma. ‘These are not just numbers: they are families who are afraid of losing their homes due to abusive price increases. These are invisible evictions that we cannot allow,’ said Truyol.
Furthermore, according to the Ministry of Social Rights, Consumption and Agenda 2030, the average income of landlords in the Balearics is €60,700, while that of tenants is €36,900, which, MÉS per Palma has warned, represents a 64 per cent gap between the two social sectors. ‘Protecting tenants is an ethical and political duty; it is about correcting structural inequality. It makes no sense to protect those who have the most and let working people fall by the wayside, as proposed by the PSOE at the state level,’ said Truyol.
The spokesperson for MÉS per Palma also denounced the fact that the rising cost of the shopping basket ‘is forcing many families to eat worse, with serious consequences for their health, especially among children and women. When a family cannot afford to buy fruit or vegetables, it is not a personal decision, but a violation of rights,’ lamented Truyol. For this reason, MÉS per Palma is calling for a reduction in VAT on essential products such as bread, milk, eggs, fruit, vegetables, legumes and cereals.
‘Guaranteeing healthy food means promoting public health, doing justice and preventing much more serious problems in the future,’ Truyol pointed out. The spokesperson for MÉS per Palma finally defended ‘a clear shift in housing policies’ in order to ‘put limits on speculation’. ‘Housing should not continue to be in the hands of speculative businesses while people are being expelled from their city. This is not a housing crisis, it is a housing scam,’ she said.
Among the notable proposals from MÉS per Palma are: creating a permanent rental contract to guarantee stability and security for tenants; applying state law to limit rental prices and ensure that homes can only be purchased for residence or for rental at a social price; protecting contract renewals with municipal protocols that prevent abuse; and prohibiting any type of tourist rental in homes.
‘Regulating prices is not radical. What is radical is allowing working in Palma not to be enough to live on,’ said Truyol, who pointed out that ‘in this situation, we have to decide whether to defend the people who live in the city or continue to allow speculation to drive them out.’ “MÉS per Palma is clear: life must come before business. And it is the responsibility of the institutions to guarantee this.”