Spain opens dedicated counters for migrants at Correos and Social Security offices

Migrant counters at Correos and Social Security: priority or collapse?

Impossible to get an appointment at Social Security for a Spanish citizen, but an express counter for migrants going through regularization? That is the question hanging over the announcement that Correos and the Social Security system will set up dedicated points to handle paperwork for foreigners applying under the upcoming extraordinary regularization.

The initiative, defended by parts of the Government as an integration tool, clashes with the daily reality of thousands of citizens who have waited weeks for an appointment for basic procedures. The measure includes restricted hours —only three hours in the afternoon— and one office per province, with two in Madrid and Barcelona. While the Government presents it as a step towards organizing irregular immigration, critics say it will further saturate public services that are already collapsed, where getting an appointment as a Spanish citizen is an odyssey.

The figures circulating do nothing to calm tempers. Sick leave at Correos has soared by 72% since 2018, worsening its operational capacity. And the Royal Decree underpinning the regularization has not yet been ratified by Congress or published in the BOE (the official state gazette), adding a layer of legal uncertainty. For some, it is a "pull effect" that will reward those who entered illegally. For others, it is a humanitarian and economic necessity.

Even subscribers of pogre media outlets, usually aligned with the Government's migration policies, have voiced their displeasure in the comments. The paradox is obvious: the same State that cannot give a self-employed worker an appointment to register finds resources to open almost express counters. As a street-level analysis put it: "for immigrants they do get quick little things done".