The two partners of the Catalan government broadcast this Tuesday, without the slightest blush, the serious disagreements that separate them during the first session of the general political debate in Parliament. Of course, while there’s a sense of walking on a tightrope at the moment, neither party is putting the finishing touches on it. President Pere Aragonès brushed aside a proposal to reach an agreement with the government without a calendar to set the terms of a referendum, and Junts not only rejected it, but also made a sweeping change in progress on the territorial axis. Junts spokesman Albert Batet urged Aragonès to stick to the government pact, even threatening that he submit to a vote of confidence, an announcement a month ago that warned he would leave Govern’s continuity to vote at the basis if there was no change of course towards secession. The CUP has also tabled a motion for next week’s plenary session, also asking for the vote of confidence. The central government also disregarded the clarity agreement proposed by Aragonès.
“How are we supposed to trust a new proposal if the agreement that facilitated its investiture is not fulfilled? Are you planning to stick to it?” Batet snapped at Aragonès, insisting on the need for “guarantees and concreteness”. Not only that: Batet sourly urged the Republican that if he didn’t give it to him, they would demand that he submit to a matter of trust, as Carles Puigdemont did back in 2017, a maneuver that ended with the promise of a referendum held in order to gain the support of the CUP. Junts has criticized Esquerra for ignoring his calls to formulate a common strategic direction for independence and the need to act together in Congress and change the focus of the dialogue table. “We told him the right thing and vice versa without getting the result we expected,” he accused.
The announcement of the possible confidence motion was met with a squeak of surprise from the Republican faction. Aragonès has already made it clear in the subsequent reply that he does not want to submit to any movement that could “destabilize” his government and urged Junts to make whatever decisions he deems appropriate. He did not explicitly mention a possible exit from the government of the post-convergents. “I have put proposals on the table, if there are alternative proposals I am willing to listen to them,” the executive branch chief said. “It is important that we strengthen the government,” has claimed Aragonès, who also hired the junts to demand loyalty. “The agreements must be viewed in their entirety,” said the President.
In a very lengthy debate, the head of the junts took the floor after 9.30pm, revealing the wound separating the government’s two partners. That ruined the efforts of members of the government, who had conspired that the debate would be a showcase to showcase the work of that year and a half of the legislature, thus conveying a message of unity despite the turbulent relations the parties make him Aragonès had in his During the morning’s speech, no effort was spared to detail the work of each director, regardless of their political persuasion, although he never mentioned the name of his partner Junts. The Republican leader had also taken the lectern to announce a plan to help families in the face of inflation and the energy crisis, 300 million euros, most of which will require the next accounts to move forward (still up in the air). to get going.
The President took note of the free nature of childcare and prevented just one law approving one of the budgets in which he takes mandate. But the attention of the hemicycle – with Laura Borràs, suspended President of the Chamber, after the session in the guest gallery – was on the Aragonès proposal on the national axis. Junts had warned a month ago that unless the course on the road to independence was straightened, the grassroots would have the final say on executive continuity. Therefore, the renewed commitment to the vote of confidence was received with astonishment. “I will not participate in any game that paralyzes the institutions,” Aragonès replied to the ERC bank chairman after Batet’s intervention.
The Canadian route that Aragonès proposes seeks to gather the experience of what happened in Canada between 1980 and 2000, when the so-called “Clarity Law”, formulated by the Supreme Court of Canada in its judgment on the secession of Quebec, was accepted. The Republican wants a deal, not a law, proposing “when and how Catalonia can resume exercising the right to decide.” The legal situations of both states are completely different and difficult to transfer, but Aragonès aims to establish parameters similar to those for the Canadian province: clarity on who determines them and what the necessary majority might be (the Canadian supreme has never quantified these Scale). According to the Supreme Court, this yes, the victory of the yes, did not imply the possibility of secession, but the opening of the process for constitutional reform.
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Aragonès assured that his “ruthlessly democratic” proposal for a clarity agreement was aimed at both independents and non-independents. And he drew from the polls of the Generalitat Opinion Research Center (CEO), the Catalan CIS, to justify that the referendum is a transversal proposal that goes beyond independence. According to the CEO, holding the referendum is the preferred option for voters from all parties except for the PP and Vox. In the PSC, support reaches 73.7%. If you look at Ciudadanos, the support is at 50%. “This social majority exists and nobody can ignore it,” he said.
The proposal, without dates or calendar, which implies that consensus will first be reached with bodies, parties and unions in Catalonia, is also intended to attract the attention of the international community. Therefore, the same terminology is used as in the Canadian case. Later it would be submitted to the government. The central executive has actively and passively ruled out the possibility of holding a referendum, and the minister’s spokeswoman, Isabel Rodríguez, repeated the hit yesterday. After the Council of Ministers, he regretted that pro-independence advocates “are sticking to their maximum demands, which the government does not share at all”.
The PSC, the main group in the chamber, tiptoed over the proposal and its chairman, Salvador Illa, described it as “deja vu”. This is an uncomfortable subject for Socialists, as the PSC defended holding an agreed referendum until less than a decade ago. In one of his policy presentations, he even picked up a path similar to Canada’s Clarity Act, which eventually made its way into the final text passed in 2016. A similar proposal and from within Republican ranks was then called the past umbrella. Aragonès is now asking the leader of this formation, Jéssica Albiach, to put pressure on the central government to implement the plan.
The debate on Catalonia’s suitability in Spain is being pointed to an urgent need for the government: the need to approve budgets. Alliance between ERC and Junts adds 64 MEPs and needs at least another four support votes to validate accounts. With the CUP already moving away from that possibility, the comunes are heralding themselves as potential allies. The PSC is also open to negotiations, but there is little sympathy within the government for this option.
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