The Government is putting pressure on the PP to accept the reform of the Immigration Law as the “only possible solution”

The Government and the PP are still far from an agreement on the reform of the Immigration Law, which aims to force the autonomous communities to accept unaccompanied foreign minors to relieve the pressure on the Canary Islands, Ceuta and Melilla. The distance between the Executive and the Popular Party has widened this Tuesday, with crossed reproaches that do not suggest an agreement. The Government spokesperson, Pilar Alegría, has urged the PP to behave “like a State party”, to show “that it has abandoned Vox” and to support the reform as “the only possible solution”. Meanwhile, the PP spokesperson, Miguel Tellado, has described the government proposal as a mere “patch” and has accused the Socialists of seeking “a blank cheque”. There have been no new contacts between the Minister of Territorial Policy, Ángel Víctor Torres, and the Popular Party parliamentary group, after the opposition party sent a document this weekend with its “unrenounceable” measures to reach an agreement.

The Government is putting pressure on the PP to accept the reform of the law that it has agreed with the Executive of the Canary Islands, which also includes the Popular Party, and which began its process in Congress on Monday. The spokesperson, Pilar Alegría, has today called on Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s party to “stop making excuses” and support the legislative modification. “Being a State party means being responsible and attending to the challenges that our country has and that the Canary Islands community and the city of Ceuta are experiencing so urgently. The PP no longer has the excuse of the extreme right, because Vox has already abandoned the PP. Now we have to check if the PP has also abandoned Vox,” said Alegría. The PP, she stressed, “has the possibility of behaving like a State party and supporting the only possible solution: the modification of the immigration law. We hope and wish that the PP will affirmatively support this modification. It is about solidarity and giving answers. “We expect a high-quality response from the PP,” he added.

The minister’s appeals have fallen on deaf ears in the PP. The parliamentary spokesman for the Popular Party has blamed the Government for the “migratory crisis” that Spain is suffering, “for allowing the borders to be a sieve”, and has distanced himself from the reform of the law. “The Government intends to change the rules of the game and make the distribution obligatory,” complained Tellado in a press conference in which he did not want to confirm whether the PP will vote against it. “Distributing minors among the communities is nothing more than a patch. The Government has to tackle the problem at its source,” claimed the spokesman, who has asked that “all means be used to fight the mafias” although he has not repeated his proposal to use the Navy to block the passage of boats, as he proposed, causing a great uproar, just a few days ago.

Tellado has avoided saying explicitly that the PP will reject the reform, but has hinted that his party does not agree with forcing a mandatory distribution of minors by law, in line with what several popular regional presidents have stated. “The Government demands a blank check from the opposition while rewarding its pro-independence partners,” he criticised. “We must find a solidarity solution between all the communities, of course, but the unsolidary ones are Junts and ERC,” he stressed, referring to the fact that Catalonia not only does not support the reform of the Immigration Law for the moment but also abstained last week on a smaller issue: the voluntary reception of 347 migrant minors (very insufficient to alleviate the collapse of the Canary Islands, which needs to relocate 3,000). The autonomous communities governed by the PP did accept this measure, causing Vox to abandon its five joint governments.

The support of the Popular Party is essential for the bill to be considered on July 23, at the last plenary session before the holiday break, but with each passing day there are fewer signs that it will be approved.