An ill-tempered visit to the Canaries by José Luis Escrivá, Spain’s minister in charge of migration, has placed the plight of several hundred migrants and the Canary Islands’ lack of facilities to accommodate them at the top of the agenda.

Arrecife has cancelled its big Three Kings parade on the 5th January because of the risk of crowds and Covid-19 transmission.

Lanzarote is the first Canary Island to launch a sewage testing system aimed at detecting traces of coronavirus before symptoms manifest themselves. The project was announced by Cabildo president Dolores Corujo last month, and is already underway.

"That's the way you have to do it". These were the words of praise offered by Spanish Health Minister Salvador Illa at a press conference last month as he referred to the way the Canary Islands have successfully managed to control and limit the second wave of Coronavirus. At the time of writing, the Canaries is the best-performing region in the whole of Spain.

Nine days after the UK government placed the Canary Islands on their safe travel list, it has effectively banned holidays from England for four weeks, following Boris Johnson’s announcement of a national English lockdown beginning on November 5th and lasting until December 2nd.

The Canarian Government today published its law requiring tourists to provide proof of a negative test result upon arrival at their accommodation.

The Canarian Government is drawing up a law that will make certification of a negative Covid test in the previous 72 hours a condition for any tourist staying in holiday accommodation on the Canary Islands. Although the date for the law to come into effect has not yet been announced, the Canarian Tourist Councillor Yaiza Castilla has said it will be “very soon” .

Manuel Muñiz, the secretary of state of Global Spain, has finally explained the Spanish government's reasons for their refusal to permit airport facilities to be used for testing.

Lanzarote's tourist association, Asolan, has declared its opposition to the Canarian Government's plans to conduct testing of tourists in hotels and tourist accommodation. Nevertheless, the Canarian government also appears to be fully aware of the plan's shortcomings.

British and German tourists will soon be joined by another important market for the Canaries, after De Telegraaf reports that the Netherlands will put the Canary Islands on their yellow list, meaning travel is permitted and Dutch visitors are only recommended to be aware of local rules and regulations against the virus.

Four Lanzarote wines won medals at the recent World Wine Awards in Brussels, which featured 8,500 wines from 47 countries.

German and British tourists can already be seen on the promenades, beaches and resorts of Lanzarote after the two most important markets for tourism in the Canary Islands declared that travel to the islands was safe.

Today, Spain will be placed under a state of alarm again for the first time since June. However, this time there will be no national lockdown and regional leaders are likely to be able to take their own decisions on how to use the wide-ranging legal powers provided by a state of alarm.

Mainland Spain is facing up to strict measures to control rampant coronavirus infection rates, and Christmas is likely to be very different from the ones we know – even here on the relatively safe Canaries.