Feijóo, spokesperson for the employer

A year later, the already leader of the PP has returned the favor by welcoming the Spanish business community, whose demands always find accommodation in the proposals they prepare at the national headquarters on Calle de Génova in Madrid. There is no debate in which the main opposition party does not place itself, with all its weapons, on the side of the bosses.

One never hears a single criticism of companies in the conservative ranks, not even a call for restraint, to pitch in or to take into account the economic situation that the country and its citizens are going through after a global pandemic and a war in Europe that has delayed the recovery of data prior to the outbreak of COVID-19.

The last example is from this week. Feijóo attended the Forbes Summit Reinventing Spain, where they asked him: “At what point was the businessman blamed and focusing on certain businessmen who are great generators of employment became one part of society against the other?”

The question did not mention any, although the name of Juan Roig floated among those present. Feijóo assumed that, indeed, the interviewer was referring to the owner of Mercadona, whom United Podemos or the unions have pointed out as one of the main beneficiaries of the price escalation. But not only.

“The slogans that are superimposed on reality need, for people to believe them, to find a culprit. There is always a culprit. When someone fails, it’s the teacher. When you don’t have the money to make ends meet, it’s because there is someone at home who spends a lot, and you don’t. When the rates were low it was thanks to the Government, now they have risen because of the banks, ”she started. And he continued: “When the megawatt was at 30 euros it was because the Government had a good energy policy. It has reached 300, now it is 100 something. It is the fault of the electric companies”, he added. And he continued: “When in the pandemic all food distribution kept products in all supermarkets in Spain, they were essential services. But now there are certain people who are dedicated to distribution who have been singled out.” Feijóo concluded with a critique of what he called “very dangerous economic, social and business populism”.

Not a single word about, for example, the record profits that Repsol (more than 70%) or Naturgy (35%) have announced this week. Or those that the banking sector has recognized: more than 20,800 million euros in 2022.

Feijóo raised in his speechin which he joked that the questions were not as expected, that an “adequate tax policy” must be made for “people who earn money” and advocated an “adequate Corporate Tax”.

But these words, put in context, may take on a different meaning than hearing them in isolation. Because Feijóo’s PP has opposed, for example, the temporary taxes on extraordinary profits for banks and energy companies that Congress has approved by the vast majority that supports the Government. In fact, Feijóo began a tough battle against these two taxes that he is keeping more underground after the president of the European Commission (of the European PP), Ursula Von der Leyen, defended the need to increase the tax burden on those who are benefiting straight out of the war in Ukraine.

In this case, Feijóo has stood by the companies, who have appealed the lien. He also did it when the Government negotiated with Brussels the cap on gas. Despite the data that confirms that the mechanism made it possible to control the rise in energy costs, and although the PP no longer calls it an “Iberian scam”, the right continues to criticize the measure.

In general terms, the response of the PP is always the same: lower taxes. To contextualize the words he said at the event organized by Forbes and paid for by important Spanish companies, less than a year ago he launched a massive reduction in taxes as a tax proposal for his mandate. Including the Corporate Tax.

From the PERTE of Tourism to aid for workshops

The coincidence between Feijóo’s proposals and those of the employers are eloquent. If the president of the PP visits Fitur, he exposes to the media his plan for a sector that, indeed, went through very hard times during the pandemic. Always speaking in the first person.

“We have not recovered international tourism,” he said. “We have an increase in prices, an increase in costs, a tension in the prices that we charge tourists and in the costs that workers who work in the field of tourism have to bear,” he added. To slide later that “60% of the recovery of GDP is based on tourism”, a data whose source is Exceltur, an association that brings together companies in the sector.

Feijóo took advantage of the cameras to demand that the Government allocate part of the European recovery funds to the sector with a specific PERTE, a claim also from the employer, and that it could be dedicated to “remodeling” hotels, for example. He also called for a “tax incentive for self-employment” and “reduce the impact of energy costs”, without going into depth.

What the president of the PP did not remember was the kellys or the workers in the sector, rather than to lament “the cost” they entail. Nor has it reminded the sector, for example, that the ERTE paid by Social Security saved these companies from sinking, in addition to allowing employees to enter a part of their payroll.

The method is repeated wherever a business sector invites Feijóo. If you go to a congress of car repair shops, the president of the PP makes a defense of the combustion engine, asks for help to withdraw diesel and gasoline vehicles to introduce others also diesel and gasoline and questions the speed of the transition ecological, which asks to do “orderly” and “little by little”.

The right-wing leader then defended tax cuts for fossil fuels. And he again met with the opposition of Von der Leyen, although he had the support of the manufacturers.

This same month of February, Feijóo met with representatives of Asaja, an agrarian employer. In a brief press release about the meeting, the PP assured that its president had “shown his concern about the rise in production costs that the sector has to face”. Words almost identical to those spread by Asaja a few days before, at the end of January.

The same happens when Feijóo goes to visit a ceramics company, or if he goes to a foundation in the sector, dependent on the Community of Madrid, just during the week of the Goya Awards. but where the private sector participatesto claim tax and business aid.

Those in charge of making their electoral program for May 28, Íñigo De la Serna and Carmen Fúnez, also hold this type of meeting. Both met with Antonio Garamendi himself at the PP headquarters. The appointment took place at the same time as the Spain-Morocco summit held in Rabat and to which the president of the employers’ association did not want to go, something exceptional in this type of international summits with countries with so many economic ties.

What the PP has not entered into is the controversy over Garamendi’s salary, which has raised the emoluments by 9% to exceed 400,000 euros per year. An amount paid by the CEOE, which receives public subsidies.

But Feijóo did have an opinion on the increase in the SMI. It is true that the PP has abandoned the strategy of opposing one of the measures that the coalition government can make the most of. If when Pedro Sánchez arrived at Moncloa in 2018 the minimum wage was set at just over 730 euros, today it has risen to 1,080 euros.

And what is the position of the PP? That the SMI should rise, yes. But little. And what should be the criteria to know when to increase it? According to Feijóo himself, “competitiveness of companies”. Always companies.