Junts and Podemos threaten a last heart-stopping plenary session with several possible defeats for the Government | Spain

New heart attack Thursday for the Government. The majority of the investiture arrives at the last plenary session of the year with several cracks whose depth will be tested in a decisive vote in the afternoon in Congress. Both Junts and Podemos, for different reasons but both with the same idea that they do not consider themselves part of the majority of the Government and negotiate point by point, threaten to force several parliamentary defeats of the Executive that would reinforce the image of weakness, although in no case They would be definitive. The Government trusts above all that Junts maintains the agreement that they reached at the highest level in an emergency videoconference in which both María Jesús Montero, vice president and Minister of Finance, and Carles Puigdemont, leader of the indepedentistas, were present. There the fiscal package was definitively closed. However, during its passage through the Senate, the PP has managed to incorporate several amendments that completely change the package and that should be reversed this Thursday in Congress. But Junts has voted in favor of some of them, minor ones for the Executive, and has abstained in others of the PP that are much more relevant. This has raised fears that it could complicate the vote this Thursday and allow some PP amendments to be maintained that represent a significant loss of income for the State.

The contacts were going to continue until the last moment, but government sources who had spoken with Junts trusted that he would keep his word and the pact closed between Montero and Puigdemont and, therefore, add their votes to the majority to overthrow the PP amendments. more relevant. Meanwhile, the popular ones hoped to have a day of parliamentary victories for themselves and defeats for the Government that would visualize one of their main messages, that is, the weakness of the Executive that in their opinion makes the legislature unsustainable.

To these problems with Junts, which have been permanent throughout the year although they have almost always been resolved at the last moment with a negotiation, is now added the growing tension with Podemos, which feels that it has been deceived because in the end there has not even been a attempt to seek an agreement with Junts and PNV for an extension of the tax on large energy companies. The Government continues with its idea, agreed with ERC, Bildu and BNG, to approve a new tax on large energy companies in a decree next week in the Council of Ministers. That was the agreement and it will be fulfilled. But Podemos wanted more: a negotiation with Junts and PNV to try to guarantee that they will validate that decree or open themselves to some type of tax. That has never come to fruition.

Government sources assume that Junts and PNV will overturn this decree when the validation reaches Congress, within a maximum period of one month, because these two parties are against the extension of this tax on energy companies, but at least there will be made the political gesture of approving it in the Council of Ministers in an agreement with the left-wing groups and it will be the Basque nationalists and the Catalan independentists who will have to assume the political cost of overthrowing it completely. That was the agreement with the left to unblock the fiscal package, but Podemos considers it insufficient and did not even attend the meeting in which this decree was agreed. Sources from the other left-wing groups, however, are confident of being able to convince Junts and PNV to validate the decree in January, and to do so they have agreed that the decree will include a system of tax credits for renewable energies.

The other delicate vote this Thursday is that of the law on efficiency in justice, a norm that is very relevant for Minister Félix Bolaños, who claims it as a historical milestone. The norm passed without problems from Congress with the votes of the majority of the investiture, but the PP has vetoed it in the Senate and now Congress must lift that blockade. Podemos has threatened not to join the majority, which would cause the law to be vetoed, because during the processing an amendment from the PNV was approved that according to the Basque nationalists goes against the occupation of homes and according to Podemos it will make evictions much easier, something for them unacceptable. Now that can no longer be changed, but the Government offers Podemos some modification later in another law to avoid the consequences that they fear. Last night there were negotiations between the Executive and Podemos. The truth is that the Government reaches the end of the year with many issues in the air and with the Budgets very far away, since they have not even started negotiating with Junts and ERC, which do not guarantee their support at all, and Podemos also puts it in question. Sánchez has insisted that he will continue ahead even if he does not have a Budget, but the Government is going to try in these weeks to seek a negotiation so that everyone can participate and there can be new Accounts, something that would put a very complex legislature on track. In any case, the Government until now has almost always managed to correct the Thursday votes at the last moment, and it is not at all ruled out that it will achieve it again this time.

The PP is confident, for its part, of achieving a parliamentary victory this Thursday and that some of its amendments to the Government’s fiscal package go ahead, an area where they have found a vein to destabilize the parliamentary majority of the Executive. The popular ones recognize contacts with Puigdemont’s party and hope that, if Junts votes “in coherence” with what it has done in recent days, several of them will prosper. The key is the amendment that Junts and the PP agreed to nine days ago in the Finance Commission, which eliminates the tax on electricity production in Spain, a tax that represents between 1,000 and 1,500 million euros per year in revenue. The popular ones do not rule out that it will go ahead, although they also doubt the possible final maneuver of Puigdemont’s men. “I distrust, until I see the result of the vote tomorrow…”, acknowledged this Wednesday in the halls of Congress a member of Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s hard core.

In any case, the PP hopes that, at a minimum, its amendment to establish a tax exemption for aid to those affected by the dana in Valencia will succeed, according to management sources. All the amendments presented by the popular parties are aimed at tax reductions, with which they intend to attract the Catalan and Basque right.

The Popular Party has increased its support for Junts to try to break the majority of the Government, although the negotiations with Puigdemont’s party are uncomfortable for the PP, after its campaign against the amnesty. For this reason, the party does not want to inform who the interlocutors are in these conversations, although they are part of the Parliamentary Group. As a gesture to Junts, the PP voted this Tuesday in the Senate in favor of two amendments from the independentistas with tax cuts. One of them involves the reduction of VAT to 4% on some basic foods, and the second refers to sports clubs, so that they are entitled to 100% of the business fee bonus for common contingencies for coaches and non-practice instructors. professional. In an informal conversation with journalists at the Christmas drink, Feijóo expressed confidence that some of his amendments will go ahead, although he has acknowledged that he does not know what Junts will finally do, nor what Puigdemont’s intention is regarding the legislature. The leader of the PP defends his confluence with those of Puigdemont because “Junts fulfills its economic program” while, on the other hand, “the PNV has decided to be an ally of the structural Government.” “We have not moved, the PNV has moved against its electoral program. It is not a criticism, it is a chronicle,” reflected Feijóo, who complains that the Peneuvistas “for less” than what is happening now “threw the PP from the Government,” in reference to the motion of censure against Mariano Rajoy.