On July 23, Congress held its last plenary session of the legislative year on a symbolic date: the first anniversary of June 23, the elections that allowed Pedro Sánchez to revalidate the progressive coalition government. The last twelve months have been marked by an intense electoral cycle – with four consecutive elections – and by complicated negotiations with Junts, an essential partner in the new majority scheme that emerged from the ballot boxes.
The last plenary session was a clear example of the difficulties that the Government has faced in these first months of the legislature, in which it has managed to pass several laws but has also suffered parliamentary defeats.
Congress approved four initiatives, some as important as the renewal of the Judiciary, the extension of the anti-crisis shield or the parity law. But the reform of the immigration law and the processing of the deficit path, a previous step for the achievement of the General State Budget, fell by the wayside.
On the same day, July 23, the Government explored almost all the formulas that the current parliamentary arithmetic allows. It agreed on several laws, including the parity law and the anti-crisis decree, with the majority of the investiture; it reached an agreement with the Popular Party for the renewal of the Judiciary, but failed in its attempt to get that party to give it the votes to push through the immigration reform. Something similar happened with the path of budgetary stability, which Junts shot down at the last minute.
Although the legislature began a year ago, in August 2023, there was hardly any legislative activity until after the formation of the new Government, in November of that year. Since then, Parliament has definitively approved two bills from the Executive and two others proposed by the parliamentary groups and six royal decrees. In addition, Congress has sent to the Senate for definitive approval another three laws from the Government and another from the groups.
Among them are some relevant norms, such as the first initiative that Congress processed this legislative year: the reform of article 49 of the Constitution to eliminate the term “disabled”. It was the third modification of the Magna Carta in the entire democracy, which had the support of all groups except Vox.
Much of these months of the legislature have been marked by the processing of the amnesty law for those indicted for the independence process, the main commitment that Pedro Sánchez made with Junts and ERC to ensure their votes in the investiture. The text was negotiated down to the last comma and although Carles Puigdemont’s party rejected it in its first vote in Congress, it was finally approved on June 10, after an electoral cycle that between February 18 and June 9 included the elections in Galicia, Euskadi, Catalonia and the European elections, with their respective campaigns.
The Government has also managed to give the green light to a bill on artistic education, another that will force governments and corporate governing bodies to comply with parity and a final text to create an independent body to investigate accidents such as the Spanair accident or the Alvia accident in Santiago de Compostela. In addition, it has sent to the Senate for final approval two laws on firefighters and forest rangers.
Congress has also submitted to the Upper House the law agreed between the PP and PSOE for the reform of the General Council of the Judiciary, a rule that both agreed on in parallel with the negotiation for the renewal of the members that was also voted on in the ‘superplenary’ meeting of July 23.
The PSOE defends parliamentary activity
The PSOE has tried in recent weeks to refute the idea that the PP is promoting that Parliament is paralyzed. “We have approved seven decrees, six laws [solo cuatro definitivamente]and 26 bills are being processed in Congress, in their different phases in the committees, in the reports… The president has appeared three times in Congress, once in the Senate and there have been 35 appearances by ministers,” listed the socialist spokesman, Patxi López, at the end of June.
Sánchez, in his end-of-term appearance at La Moncloa, praised the Government’s legislative production but clarified that a Government should not be evaluated solely from that perspective. “In Spain there has always been an excessively legislative conception of the government’s action. We often use the number of laws passed to measure the strength or performance of an executive, when in reality it is an indicator that tells us more about the situation of the Legislative Power, that is, of Parliament,” he said. “Laws are very important […]but I think that the essential thing is that laws are an instrument to achieve results, […] a means, not an end. What matters, what changes people’s lives, are our results,” he summed up.
The main opposition party, meanwhile, has tried to counter this alleged legislative paralysis with its victories in the Lower House. Its spokesman, Miguel Tellado, went so far as to speak of a “milestone” a month ago in Congress to celebrate the “110 approved initiatives” between non-legislative proposals and motions, although he avoided detailing whether each section of these PNL or the motions, which are frequently voted on separately in the chamber, counted as initiatives.
The reality, however, is that the PP has not managed to get any of its laws to advance in the process in Congress. Only two have been taken into consideration and of the ten that come from the Senate, none have taken any steps either in the meetings of the committee or in the commissions and therefore not in the plenary session.
The dialectical clashes have not prevented the two main opposition parties from reaching agreements over the past few months. Beyond the renewal of the Judiciary, both forces reached an agreement on the reform of article 49 of the Constitution and the PP abstained on Tuesday from approving the decree that extends the economic measures to deal with the crisis arising from the war in Ukraine.
Disagreements within the Government
The last few months of the legislative session have been marked by some disagreements within the Government. The first of these was a law promoted by the Socialist Group in Congress to prohibit pimping, which generated an intense debate in the plurinational group, where there are different positions on prostitution. Sumar decided to vote against its consideration amid criticism of the PSOE for considering that it was carrying out such an initiative to divide its partner.
That same week, at the end of May, on the threshold of the European election campaign, Sumar also positioned itself against the Land Law drafted by the Ministry of Housing, which the socialist part of the Government was taking to Congress for its first parliamentary procedure. Then, the PSOE tried to get the favorable vote of Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s party, difficult to obtain in the middle of the pre-campaign. The refusal of the popular party forced the Government to withdraw it at the last moment to avoid a new defeat.
Sumar also broke the voting unity within the coalition this month, in the proposed law agreed between the PP and PSOE to reform the General Council of the Judiciary. Yolanda Díaz’s party celebrated the agreement that put an end to the blockade of that body but abstained from voting on the reform due to their anger at having been left out of that agreement.
The difficult support of Junts
Junts was a key part of Pedro Sánchez’s investiture and its support is essential for the Government in this legislature. Every time its seven deputies have announced their vote against an initiative, the Executive’s negotiators have been forced to speak with the PP or resign themselves to losing that vote. Carles Puigdemont’s party has repeated on several occasions that it is not part of any block in Congress. They refer to the ‘investiture block’ or the ‘partners of the Government’, that group of parties that usually support the parliamentary support for the progressive coalition.
While it is true that Catalan separatists have lent their support to various initiatives during this legislature, Sánchez cannot take their support for granted, especially in these months marked by the political situation in Catalonia.
The last plenary session of the political year was a good example of how closely connected state and Catalan politics are. After learning that the President of the Government and the acting President, Pere Aragonès, would meet in Barcelona, in the midst of negotiations between PSC and ERC that have resulted in the ‘yes’ of the ERC bases to the investiture of Salvador Illa, Junts announced in Congress that it rejected the path to stability that was being processed that day in Congress, a previous step for the approval of the budgets.
The ruling parties saw this move as a warning from Junts, although they rejected the idea that this gesture could endanger the stability of the legislature.
That is why Sánchez appealed directly to Puigdemont’s party in his appearance this week, asking it to make a “useful” opposition, also with regard to next year’s budget. “I would like the difficulty in finding agreements in the Cortes Generales that has dominated these last electoral months to end. I hope that all parties accept once and for all the mandate that the citizens gave us on July 23, and that they understand that now is not the time to continue making a permanent electoral campaign,” Sánchez demanded.
Add Comment