BarcelonaSalvador Illa arrived at the Palau de la Generalitat with a fragile and narrow majority: 68 deputies who were the sum of the deputies of the PSC, ERC and the commons. This same majority has served him in his first general policy debate to push forward resolution proposals that defend the agreement for the unique financing agreed with the Republicans, the regulation of seasonal rentals or the transfer of Rodalies. However, the socialists have used a variable geometry to validate all the resolutions that have been presented. There have been votes that have saved them with the votes of Junts and others with a priori unnatural alliances in which the votes of the PP and the commons have been added, as is the case of a proposal that advocated taking forward the “actions necessary to regain Catalonia’s economic leadership” or also in the field of digitalisation.
Despite having reached the plenary session with separate proposals on singular financing, the investiture partners ended up ratifying one of the agreements that Illa brought to the Palace of the Generalitat. Predictably, they have not managed to join together. Those of Carles Puigdemont have once again distanced themselves from the pact between the PSC and the ERC and have defended themselves behind their own proposal for an “economic concert”, in a resolution that Parliament overturned and which, explicitly, bet for Catalonia to leave of the common financing system. Esquerra, which defends that its pact with the PSC means both things, has voted in favor of it. Parliament has also not endorsed the PP’s proposal to negotiate new funding for Catalonia with the rest of the autonomous regions. Where the PSC has managed to get both Junts and ERC on its side is in the defense of the officiality of Catalan in the European institutions.
El Prat airport and the Hard Rock
Together they have not been there with the financing, but the coincidences with the PSC have resurfaced, especially on more generic issues. “Review and update the efficiency, effectiveness and fairness of the tax basket”, for example, or “promote urgent measures to guarantee access to housing for young people and vulnerable families”.
On the other hand, with regard to the expansion of the airport, there has been no common position, unlike on other occasions in Parliament. The Socialists have voted against the proposal of the board members on this issue because it called for the integral transfer of the management of the airport to the Generalitat. Making a balance, the PSC did vote in favor of the resolutions of the PP (alongside Vox) and ERC on this infrastructure. The first asked to turn it into one hub international and the second urged the Generalitat to “modernize” the Catalan airport system taking into account territorial sustainability and the reduction of polluting emissions with a “new governance model” in which the Government is “a determining actor”. The same formula that the PSC and ERC used for the investiture agreement.
The Hard Rock has been another hot potato. The macrocasino no longer has sufficient support in the Catalan Chamber, because the Parliament has urged the Government not to “facilitate” this project: two proposals from the PSC and the commons have been approved that provide for an increase in the gambling tax , as was also fixed in the investiture agreements. But in this same field, the PSC has played an ambivalent role because it has abstained from a PP proposal that calls for approving the Urban Master Plan of the Hard Rock and the environmental report before one year. The proposal, however, did not succeed.
Independence, divided
The socialists have not lost a single vote, but it is also true that they have withdrawn two: one on the local world and another that was betting on resolving the political conflict with the State by looking for consensus formulas in civil society. In neither of the two did they have a guaranteed majority and would probably have been the black spot in the votes for the Government.
Instead of defending it before the chamber, the PSC has chosen to support the proposal of the commons on amnesty, which is more lukewarm than the one presented by pro-independence groups charging against the judiciary. In fact, Junts, ERC and the CUP have only agreed to jointly present the resolution that demanded the immediate application of the amnesty law, but which has not gone ahead because the PSC voted against it. The pro-independence alliance has also made itself visible when rejecting the monarchy in a resolution that has also not gone ahead because the PSC voted against it alongside the PP and Vox.
The loss of the majority in the chamber offers the picture of a Parliament that no longer defends the right to self-determination or the referendum. The ERC resolution that talked about it has been rejected, with the vote in favor of the CUP, the abstention of Junts and the vote against the rest. Nor has he taken forward a cupaire proposal that defended the break with the State.
