Sánchez offers Junts to transfer the millions not spent in the PGE to save the ‘Catalan quota’

It is about saving the agreement between the PSOE and ERC for what they call singular financing. The two parties, which sooner rather than later will have to vote on a modification of the Organic Law of Financing of the Autonomous Communities (LOFCA), try to convince Junts not to prevent the reform of this norm from going ahead. The seven votes of those of Carles Puigdemont, who ask for an economic agreement, are vital for the agreement between the PSOE and ERC to receive the approval of the Cortes. And today, according to Junts sources, its position is not exactly that of facilitating compliance with that agreement between the Socialists and the Catalan Republicans. Pedro Sánchez, in the last meeting with the mediator in Switzerlandheld this Monday, promised them more money in exchange for their vote in favor. In that same meeting, and after the two previous rejections, the junteros left the door open to supporting the spending ceiling.

Although the text agreed between the PSC and ERC is vaguely committed to a tax treatment for Catalonia differentiated from that of the other autonomous communities, something that has raised many blisters at the territorial level, this is insufficient for JxCat. The party founded by Puigdemont, which at the end of this month will hold its extraordinary congress in Calella (Barcelona), and which wants to attract those dissatisfied with ERC after making Salvador Illa president, demands to go one step further and that the State and the Generalitat agree on a Catalan quota in the Basque or Navarrese style. A demand that the socialists, until now, have rejected. But as in so many other issues previously, in which they firmly refused to cross certain red lines, Moncloa can always change its mind, if the stability of the Government led by Sánchez depends on it.

The fear in the ranks of the PSOE and ERC that Junts could carry out its threat, and leave on deaf ears what was agreed between both parties last August, in exchange for making Illa president, is real. The leaders of both parties do not even try to hide it. For the Sánchez family, the rejection of Junts would mean having assumed unprecedented internal wear and tear with the concession made to ERC for nothing. For the Republicans, however, having given their votes to the PSC without achieving any significant progress. Although in this last case ERC could use the vote against JxCat to attack its main political rival, holding them responsible for having prevented unprecedented progress in economic matters.

Rain of millions

Pedro Sánchez is willing to buy the will of Junts with a shower of millions in Catalonia. Specifically with a direct transfer to the Government for the value of all those budgeted investments, but whose works have not been executed. This is the proposal that the president’s emissaries put on Carles Puigdemont’s table last Monday, during the meeting that both parties held in Zurich (Switzerland) with the presence of the international mediator. The non-execution of compromised infrastructures has always been one of the main demands of separatism. For this reason, Sánchez seeks to encourage his partners with a million-dollar transfer, which compensates for all the works not carried out, allowing Catalonia to raise more money.