Nursing homes bear the enormous responsibility of ensuring a dignified life for thousands of citizens, many of whom arrive to spend the most fragile and vulnerable years of their lives. Their work is essential, as the sector itself acknowledges when it denounces the lack of human and material resources with which it faces this task, in a country where, given the ever-increasing life expectancy, these facilities and services will become increasingly necessary.

Andrés Hinajeros's national identity card is atypical in two ways. First, it's permanent—without an expiration date—having been issued twenty years before he turned 70. Second, it doesn't bear his signature. This is a strange concession from the administration to Hinajeros, who has been paralyzed from strength to mobility in his arms and hands since May 1974, when, as a young man in his twenties, he became a paraplegic. He endured four grueling years of hospitalization during which he confesses his only desire was to die. But he has recovered and today says he feels content with life, to the point that he celebrates both his biological birthday and May 17th—which, as he says, "is the day I was reborn." "I'm happy," he says, "I live with quadriplegia, but I've accepted it." In this second phase of his life, he has married, had a son, and owned an orthopedics shop until his retirement. Retirement has led him to focus on obtaining official recognition of his fingerprint. He complains that banks and notaries do not allow him to use his fingertip to sign documents, offering him only the option of bringing two witnesses or appointing a guardian—requirements that make him feel like "a slave who needs masters," even though each fingerprint is unique. This has happened to him recently when making his will. "Many times they tell me to have my wife come and sign, but I am fully capable and they won't let me be free," he laments. The procedure he requests is simple, and he performs it with the help of his wife or the personal assistant who accompanies him for daily tasks: pressing the pad of his thumb into a small box with a pad moistened with blue ink until it is imprinted, and then stamping the fingerprint onto a sheet of paper. He has complained to several organizations, but always receives a negative response. "They tell me they're doing it to protect me, but the bottom line is that if you have a disability, you cease to be a person. They don't see me, they see my wheelchair." Sources at the Notarial Association justify this by citing Article 195 of the Spanish Notarial Regulations, which states that if a person is unable to sign a document, they can delegate their signature to another person or appoint a witness to verify their identity. Hinarejos finds this argument absurd and points out that the imposition of witnesses represents a loss of privacy and autonomy.

Patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in Catalonia will be able to apply for the benefit of the long-awaited ELA law Starting next week, a year and a half after its approval in the Congress of Deputies, the Catalan government will give the green light to its implementation at its weekly meeting on Tuesday, March 17th, and patients will be able to apply that same week. Once it receives an application, the Catalan executive will have a maximum of three months to respond, recognize the degree of disability, and provide the assistance. The Department of Social Rights estimates that there are around 200 people who can apply for Level III+ of extreme dependency—created specifically for this condition—which is intended to guarantee the rights of those suffering from it. incurable neurodegenerative disease to receive specialized service up to 24 hours a day if needed.

Reducing waiting lists for residential care and increasing resources to combat child poverty and the risk of homelessness are the main priorities outlined this Wednesday by the Minister of Social Rights, Mònica Martínez Bravo, during the presentation of the draft budget for her department. The allocation for Social Rights has increased by 28% compared to 2023, reaching €4.248 billion, and according to the Minister, its objective is to strengthen the welfare state. In this regard, if the budget is approved, the Government anticipates the creation of approximately one thousand new residential care places—primarily for the elderly, but also for people with disabilities—by that same year.

For five years, the Union of Mothers in Functional Diversity has been fighting for the rights of people with disabilities and their caregivers. The group—which brings together mothers and sisters from several generations—denounces systematic mistreatment by the administration due to bureaucracy and a underfunding of services and activitiesHowever, in the last five years they have earned the right to be direct interlocutors with the regional ministry and a major social entity.

The Catalan government is considering creating a fund to finance municipalities based on their migrant population, aiming to improve their reception services and reduce their dependence on subsidies. This is one of the proposals from the Committee of Experts for Social Transformation and Innovation (CETIS) of the Department of Social Rights, which presented a report on Monday detailing the situation of the 1.4 million foreigners living in Catalonia, a country with a population of 8 million. The Catalan Fund for Reception and Inclusion seeks to provide Catalan mayors with more tools to better plan for the arrival of immigrants, offering them a fixed budget that goes beyond the current subsidy programs and ad hoc plans that often end without having delivered the desired results because, quite simply, the expected results have been achieved. At the presentation of the report, the Minister of Social Rights, Mònica Martínez Bravo, indicated that the fund could be integrated into the new program for local governments, and that the Generalitat's future budgets, if approved, will include additional funding to support this group, following the agreement between the PSC and Comuns parties. The fund proposal is still just an idea, but it has the backing of the Minister, who declined to specify which public policies or initiatives it might finance. In this regard, she referred to the fact that municipalities are aware of the real "needs" of each town in order to decide how to invest the funds. At a time when far-right groups are fighting policies that promote social cohesion, the Minister stated that the Catalan Government will be "very vigilant in ensuring compliance with the law" in those local councils that attempt to circumvent the law and discriminate against or criminalize migrants.

More than Two million Catalans receive care from organizations gathered at the Roundtable of Third Sector Social Entities, which is confident that Parliament will approve, after three years, the third sector law which must recognize the work carried out by professionals and volunteers. Since May 2025, Xavier Trabado Farré has been its president, replacingEnric Morist, died suddenly

Social organizations will be integrated into the process for regularizing immigrants in Catalonia, which is expected to begin in April and could benefit between 120,000 and 150,000 migrants in Catalonia. This is one of the main conclusions of the summit held this Wednesday between the Catalan government, the Spanish government delegation, representatives of unions and employers' associations, local administrations, and the third sector. The objective of the meeting was to lay the groundwork for a national "alliance" to support citizens who need to complete this process. The aim is to create a broad network of individuals and organizations that will facilitate the regularization process, for example, by making information about the requirements more accessible. In addition to collaborating with social organizations, the Catalan government is studying whether citizen service offices should be activated to expedite procedures. "We are in the process of figuring out how to get started," assured the Minister of Social Rights, Mònica Martínez Bravo. Evidence of the need for a clearer and more streamlined process to benefit from this regulation has been seen in recent days at the Pakistani consulate in Barcelona, ​​where training sessions have been held over the past week. queues of hundreds of people who came to obtain one of the documents necessary to qualify for regularization.

Correction by the Martorell City Council government. Last November, the executive formed by Junts and the PSC approved the prohibition of filling jugs with water from the municipality's public fountains To prevent residents without access to tap water at home from taking it for domestic use, the city government, led by council member Xavier Fonollosa, has decided to scale back the measure. Now, following criticism from social organizations and the opposition, as well as intervention from the ombudsperson, Esther Giménez-Salinas, the city council will only fine those who take more than 25 liters of water from municipal fountains. The municipal government will bring a modification to the ordinance prohibiting filling water jugs at public fountains to the plenary session in February. The original text was open for public comment for 30 business days, during which some twenty organizations—including Cáritas, Raíces Fundación, ECAS, Fundación Ficat, and the Human Rights Commission of the Barcelona Bar Association—submitted objections requesting the withdrawal of the measure, arguing that the use of public fountains violates a human right.

Information about the CUME (National Insurance Benefit), a benefit received by parents who must care for children with serious illnesses, circulates among families as classified information. The Spanish government has had it under the Social Security umbrella since 2011, but these families complain that hospitals or social services often don't know that they can qualify for a reduction in working hours of at least 50% while receiving their full salary so they can dedicate themselves to accompanying their child to the doctor or keeping an eye on them. They also complain that the labor mutual insurance companies pressure them to return to work as soon as possible and have the final say, even overriding a medical report.

In the first nine months of this year, an average of 25 dependent people on the waiting list for assessment or benefits have died every day in Catalonia. According to data published this Friday by the State Observatory for Dependency, up to October 1, 6,851 Catalans have died without any institutional response to their needs, a figure that represents one in four of the 25,000 dependent people who have died across the country.

Work and, above all, housing are the two major factors that mark social inequalityThis is also the case for the migrant population in Barcelona, ​​​​who suffer greater residential exclusion than those born in the State. First, because the majority must live in rented accommodation, at the mercy of sharp increases in market prices, and second, because they hold the lowest-paid jobs, according to the conclusions of the first report of the Observatory of Migration and Refuge of the Metropolis Institute, with data from 2022 and 2023. ~BK_S00 a rental contract, compared to 20% of native-born residents. This difference makes them more vulnerable to residential pressure, since the average rental expense is €1,000 per month, double that of homeowners. Furthermore, since migrants earn an average of €9,000 less per year, they must make a greater effort to meet expenses. In fact, they allocate 41.6% of their earnings to housing, more than double that of those born in the State (18.5%). By tenure, the report reveals that, apart from the 70% who rent, 11% of foreigners own their own home, fully paid for, compared to 57% of natives. The rest are left to cope with mortgage bills.

Shortly before turning 18, Nico (a pseudonym) applied for the emancipation benefit that young people who have left care are entitled to when they reach the age of majority to ease their transition into adulthood, considering that most lack the emotional or financial support of their families. The process took more than a year, to the point that, with no other source of income, he had to put his studies on hold and go to work.

The Minister of Social Rights, Mònica Martínez Bravo, has admitted that the department she heads was operating until 2023 with a great lack of resources, both human and technical, which has led to part of the problems in relation to the economic benefits This was denounced by the Audit Office and detailed by Ombudsman Maria Àngels Cabasés in Parliament on Thursday. "The benefits were managed with software equivalent to a notepad; the scope of the benefits was designed without sufficient technical rigor," said Martínez Bravo, who took advantage of her speech before the parliamentary committee to announce that they will promote debt forgiveness for young people in former care who improperly received financial benefits. This announcement by the minister came after Cabasés presented 27 conclusions stemming from the audit of the department's accounts, which concluded that almost 168 million euros were paid improperly between 2016 and 2024. However, according to the minister, 70 million euros of those 168 million euros have already been recovered, and the majority—up to 90%—will eventually be repaid.

The modernization of nursing homes, homes for people with disabilities, and mental health centers will have to wait. The Generalitat (Catalan government) is giving centers another year to demonstrate that their facilities and services meet the necessary standards to be able to offer places to beneficiaries of the dependency law. This accreditation process was originally scheduled to end next month, but the Department of Social Rights and Inclusion has postponed the deadline until October 2026 to facilitate the correction of the deficiencies that currently prevent them from obtaining approval and prevent their closure.

Until just over a year ago, the universal basic income (UBI) was one of the proposals at the center of the debate regarding innovative social policies. Its universality generated division: those in favor considered it a transformative and interesting policy precisely for that reason, while opponents argued that social benefits should discriminate positively based on income. Pere Aragonès's government embraced the idea of universality and promoted a pilot project on the basic income, aimed at a small group of people to study the extent to which it can improve the lives of those who receive it. Although one of the conditions of ERC's support for Salvador Illa's investiture was precisely to maintain this pilot project, the project is currently on hold, according to several sources told ARA.

Hand disability and dependency, complementary aid, and more support at home. These are some of the new features of the draft reform of the dependency and disability laws that the Council of Ministers approved this Tuesday in the second round of voting. It now faces parliamentary proceedings. The Minister of Social Rights, Pablo Bustinduy, has defended the initiatives as "far-reaching" in the legislature because, on the one hand, they protect people with disabilities from discrimination and, on the other, they project the new care model into the future, assuming the high rates of population aging in the coming years.

To the prejudices pointed out by feminist women, immigrants, poor people, Roma people or the LGBTIQ community, we must add the impact of misinformation, the lies that spread like wildfire through virtual profiles. It is not that false information is a modern scenario, but in the last decade there has been "a turning point", starting with Brexit and the first elections in which Donald Trump won in the US.

The Department of Social Rights improperly paid €167.56 million in economic benefits during the 2016-2024 period. This is confirmed by a report from the Audit Office released this Wednesday, which indicates that these improper payments "are not only due to administrative errors" but also to "structural problems of transparency and governance." Some of these payments, unclaimed and time-barred due to the administration's inaction in monitoring and controlling them, have resulted in "effective damage to public finances" and, therefore, could give rise to "acts that are administratively and judicially prosecuted." In this case, which primarily affects the guaranteed citizen income and long-term care benefits, legal proceedings could be opened against those responsible for improperly authorizing these payments. For its part, the Department of Social Rights maintains that €156 million of the €167 million has already been claimed from the beneficiaries of these benefits.

As she enters adolescence, Amina S. dreams of being able to enter the academy and earn a place in the Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police) or the Local Police. Before that, however, she will have to obtain her papers and even acquire Spanish nationality. For now, at 17, after four years in Catalonia, she is waiting for her case to be resolved, once her father has regularized his status and can begin the process of obtaining family roots for his two children, while her mother must follow a separate procedure. "Not having papers makes you feel different, because you so often feel like there's an invasion of illegal immigrants!" says this young woman, who only thinks "about the future" and has never been able to return to her country of origin, not even when a grandmother died. "We wouldn't have been able to go back," she notes.