General Daily Briefing: Sunday, 27 September 2026
Good morning. Here is your Sunday briefing for 27 September 2026: the day's essential Portugal stories for residents, immigrants and anyone keeping an eye on the country, with two new practical guides for drivers at the top.
- Public finances: Mário Centeno warns of 12 billion euros in cuts over two years unless Brussels revises Portugal's targets.
- Cost of living: the 25 euro discount on bottled gas for low-income households is extended to the end of December.
- Animals: the GNR has recorded more than 2,600 cases of animal abandonment and cruelty since the start of 2024.
- Driving: driving schools want every driving test monitored, and say a licence can cost up to 1,000 euros.
- Venezuela: AICEP will open a trade office in Caracas ahead of a ministerial business trip in late October.
- Azores: the regional government opens nine million euros of applied research calls, mostly for green projects.
Buying a Car at a Tax Office Auction in Portugal
The tax office sells cars seized for unpaid tax through its online auctions. How to find them, inspect them, bid, pay and register the car in your name.
Getting Your Car Back After It Is Towed in Portugal
How to find a towed or clamped car, what you pay to get it back, what to bring, and how long you have before it is treated as abandoned.
Also Published Since Yesterday's Briefing
- The Lisboa Brief, Week of 26 September 2026: The 20 Euro Rail Pass Becomes Law for Lisbon's Trains, a Navegante Ticket for Visitors, and 90 Homes for Posted Staff
- Non-Residents Would Pay or Show Insurance for Non-Urgent SNS Care Under a Bill the Governing Parties Have Brought Back to Parliament
- Lisbon's New Airport Lost Its Second Terminal in ANA's Latest Plan, and the Government Has Told ANA to Explain Why
- Richard Zimler, Porto's American-Born Novelist, Is Writing His Next Adult Novel in Portuguese First
- Americans Top Portugal's Golden Visa List Again as Grants Climb 29 Percent to 2,685, but AIMA No Longer Reports the Money Invested
- Portugal Clears up to 383 Million Euros for the SNS 24 Health Line From 2027 to 2032, With a New International Tender to Follow
- A Castelo Branco Funeral Home Named a Dead 19-Year-Old as the Driver of Its Speeding Van, and a Court Has Ordered It to Pay 36,770 Euros
- A Student Renting Away From Home Can Take up to 400 Euros Off the Family's IRS Bill, if the Landlord and the Student Both Tell the Tax Office
- Porto Shows King Pedro IV's Heart in Public for Only the Third Time Since 1835, and Sunday Is the Last Day
- Filmed Slapping a Prisoner, a Guard Faced No Case Because Time Ran Out, the Ombudsman's Prison Inspectors Report
- Councils Late on Social Housing Can Claim 10 More Points of State Funding if Portugal 2030 Also Backs the Homes
- Portugal's 1411 Suicide Prevention Line Took About 25,600 Calls in Its First Year, Nearly 700 From People at Imminent Risk
- Fake Supplier Emails Cost a Braga Company 139,812 Euros, Prosecutors Say, and Two People Now Face Money Laundering Charges
Centeno Warns of a 12 Billion Euro Squeeze
The former finance minister and former Bank of Portugal governor Mário Centeno accused the government of governing through fear, in an interview with Antena 1 and Jornal de Negócios. Responding to Luís Montenegro's warning against a return to the bailout years, he asked: "When a prime minister frightens us, we should ask ourselves what he knows that we do not." Unless Brussels revises Portugal's budget targets, he said, the State faces 12 billion euros in cuts over two years, and the reported surplus only exists because Social Security's balance is counted. "We squandered that money," he said of the 2023 surpluses. On Saturday he launched his book Contas Certas in Lisbon, before António Costa and the Socialist leader José Luís Carneiro, and said he is not one of the political actors who must now build stability.
Bottled Gas Help Extended to December
The Council of Ministers has extended the Botija Solidária to the end of December. It takes 25 euros off up to two gas bottles a month for households on the social electricity tariff or with a member receiving a minimum social benefit, such as the solidarity supplement for older people, the social integration income, the social old-age or disability pension or the social unemployment benefit. The measure will cost 5.7 million euros this year. Road hauliers and bus companies also get an extraordinary regime so that each can recover up to 70 percent of the fuel increase, whatever the EU's de minimis aid limits.
More Than 2,600 Animal Cruelty Cases Since 2024
The GNR's nature protection service, SEPNA, recorded 982 cases of abandonment and 1,668 cases involving the death or mistreatment of animals between January 2024 and August 2026, after almost 19,200 inspections. The force rescued more than 7,500 animals over the period, almost 2,900 of them in the first half of 2026. Its SOS Ambiente e Território line (808 200 520) received more than a thousand animal reports, most from the districts of Porto, Setúbal and Lisbon. The GNR says timely reports from the public are essential to fighting abandonment and cruelty.
Driving Schools Want Tests Monitored
ANIECA, which represents more than 730 driving schools, wants every driving test tracked from start to finish to end cunhas, the favours it says can tip a result, and says some tests run shorter than the 50 minutes set. Its president, António Pinto Reis, told ECO the association also opposes this year's rule letting learners practise with a tutor instead of an instructor, and questions who is liable in an accident. For anyone about to learn: a licence advertised at about 500 euros can end up costing 900 to 1,000 euros with extra lessons, he said.
A Portuguese Trade Office for Caracas
AICEP, Portugal's trade and investment agency, will open a commercial office at the Portuguese embassy in Caracas, an adviser to its board, João Mota Pinto, told Lusa during a week-long visit. He sees "immense opportunities" in construction, industrial machinery, food and electricity services, but urged caution. The ambassador, Manuel Frederico Pinheiro da Silva, said the economy minister, Manuel Castro Almeida, plans to visit Venezuela at the end of October with a business delegation to meet Venezuelan, Portuguese and Luso-Venezuelan companies.
Nine Million Euros for Azores Research
The Azores regional government is opening nine million euros in Açores 2030 research calls, announced on Friday at Macaronight, the European Researchers' Night event in Ponta Delgada. 6.5 million euros go to research that helps the transition to a greener, climate-resilient economy, open to companies of any size and to the islands' research bodies; about 2.6 million to business research and development; and about 500,000 euros to help firms hire highly qualified staff for proofs of concept. Closing dates will be set in the Açores 2030 notices.
