Spain’s conservative People’s Party (PP), the Catalan separatists Junts and the far-right Vox party banded together on Tuesday (July 23) to vote against a proposal for law in the Spanish lower house of parliament.

The proposal was aimed at dealing with an increase in the numbers of children and teens traveling alone in the North African enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla and to the Canary Islands.

Authorities in the Canary Islands have long been calling on the national government in Madrid to help them deal with the increasing numbers of unaccompanied minors arriving this year.

At the end of a long parliamentary session, the Congress of Deputies voted against starting a parliamentary procedure to approve a reform making it mandatory to redistribute unaccompanied migrant minors across the country’s regions.

The initiative, proposed by the Socialist PSOE party, Sumar and Coaliccion Canaria (CC), to deal with the situation in the enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla and the Canary Islands – which with over 6,000 underage migrants exceeds hosting capacity by 150 percent - was blocked with 177 no votes by MPs with the Catalan separatist Junts, far-right party Vox and PP lawmakers, against 171 yes votes and one abstention.

Also read: Canaries renew call for broader distribution of unaccompanied minors

Defeat for Socialists and Premier Pedro Sanchez

The defeat did not come as a surprise for the progressive government. Spokespeople for the PP and Junts parliamentary groups had already announced they would be voting against the start of a parliamentary debate on the proposed reform.

"They want it to be a landslide on humanity and solidarity – they should really start to negotiate, if they have the willpower to do it," said PP MP Ana Alòs. The lawmaker wanted assurances there would be a declaration of a state of emergency on migration across Spain, a crackdown on border controls and the summoning of a conference of presidents in exchange for her backing.

Members of the PP ignored the appeal of the governor of the Canary Islands Fernando Clavijo, a member of the party, who had asked the PP leader, Alberto Nunez Feijoo, at the beginning of the session to at least allow the draft legislation on "mandatory and united" hosting to be examined to then discuss amendments during parliamentary debate.

Also read: 'You have to see how they arrive with swollen feet'

Regional politics

For her part, the spokeswoman of Junts in the lower house, Miriam Nougueras, accused the executive of "abusing the solidarity" of Catalonia in drafting legislation that would "oversaturate" municipal resources and which "doesn’t offer dignified living conditions to migrant minors" thus "giving wings" to the right and far-right.

The party of former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont warned that "the time has come to dig our heels in front of the government" of Pedro Sanchez, on the same day the premier confirmed he would be visiting Catalonia.

Sanchez is headed to Catalonia in order to meet the outgoing governor, Pere Aragones, of the Esquerra Republicana party. Sanchez is hoping to broker an agreement on the transfer of powers to the region, while at the same time, paving the way for an appointment of Socialist party Salvador Illa as President of the Generalitat, the body that presides over the self-governing region of Catalonia.

It has been almost 20 years since the socialist party led this body, and it is a position that in the past was held by Puigdemont.