He PSOE and Add They have closed his agreement to re-elect Pedro Sánchez and form a new coalition government. The investiture remains unclearin the absence of the pact with the Catalan and Basque sovereigntists (especially with Togetherthe party with which understanding is more complicated), but Sánchez and Yolanda Diaz They have chosen to seal the program for a future Government, if it starts up. The document will be presented at 12:30 p.m. at the Reina Sofía Museum (Madrid).
The negotiations They lasted until late into the night this Mondayand the agreement was only unlocked with a meeting between Yolanda Diaz and Pedro Sanchez in La Moncloa. Early this Tuesday, at the stroke of eight in the morning, both parties finally released a joint statement announcing the white smoke with an agreement that does finally include the reduction of working hours, an issue that had become the last stumbling block.
The text agreed between PSOE and Sumar indicates that It was their leaders who “closed the details” of the Government agreement, and insist on the vocation for stability and permanence of the eventual executive, pointing out that the agreement “will serve for a four-year term.” Furthermore, they emphasize that it arrives “before the deadline that PSOE and Sumar had set themselves to achieve”.
Sánchez and Díaz met in the Congress of Deputies on October 4, within the framework of the round of contacts for the investiture. The president and the acting second vice president committed that the pact would be ready before the end of October. Finally, three weeks later and after a few last days of intense negotiations and exchanges of roles, both parties have sealed their alliance. Now everything depends on CKD, Together, EH Bilduhe PNV and the BNGthe rest of the groups that Sánchez needs to be invested.
Measures
He joint statement from Sumar and PSOE includes other measures such as the increase in the SMI; the expansion of paid birth leave or “a fair tax reform that makes banks and large energy companies contribute to public spending”, a measure that could respond to Yolanda Díaz’s request to make the bank tax permanent.
Furthermore, it refers to the “development of housing law for the regulation of rents”, although without mentioning the housing price index that Sumar demanded in order to make price control effective, and without mentioning the control of tourist rentals, as Díaz claimed, pending the details of the agreement.
Also included is the increase in public housing stock with the objective of reaching 20% of the total park, along with other measures the “reinforcement” of the public health system, the “upward review” of the objectives of the climate change law, the expansion of paid birth leave and the universalization of education from 0 to 3 years.
Sumar has reported that to those matters included in the joint statement is added the “dismissal reform”, lThe repeal of the gag law, the reform of the territorial financingthe increase in minimum wage so that purchasing power and a care law are not lost, although none of these points appear in the PSOE statement.
“Very satisfied” in Sumar
Sumar’s spokesperson, Ernest Urtasun, has assured that they are “very satisfied“because of the content of the pact. In statements on TVE, the MEP indicated that “It’s a very good agreement“and that “recollects many social advances.”
Regarding the reduction of working hours, which became the last obstacle to be unblocked, Urtasun has announced that the “commitment” has been sealed to approve a weekly working day of 37.5 hours, as Sumar demanded by 2024. A commitment that ““It will be reflected in a very clear way.”, and that “it is going to be done.” A starting point, in short, that could later be expanded through social dialogue, he explained.
The leader, a member of the Greens in the European Parliament, has stuck out his “expansion of rights in environmental matters“, which in his opinion represents “a great step forward.” Among the measures announced by Sumar that do not appear in the joint statement is the “replacing short flights with affordable train travel“. In this sense, Urtasun has pointed out that “the things that Sumar said we wanted in that agreement are very well reflected.”
The spokesperson has been optimistic regarding the investiture of Pedro Sánchez and about the negotiations with the rest of the actors, mainly ERC and Junts. Asked about the amnesty, to which there is no reference in the agreement, Urtasun has once again defended that “the amnesty law has to go ahead, but it is part of another agreement.” A negotiation with the independence supporters that, he has pointed out, “is progressing in a reasonable manner.” “At Sumar we are optimistic, we believe that there will be an investiture and that all the issues we present, therefore, are going to come true.”
Workday
He main obstacle between the coalition partners was in the last hours the refusal of the socialists to accept a reduction in the working dayan issue that Sumar considered “essential” and that has conditioned the joint statement, which was made public this Monday at mid-afternoon.
The socialists considered this agreement imminent from the first hour on Monday morning, but in Díaz’s team the times cooled, alleging that the reduction of the working day was not included in the last proposal submitted by the socialists, and that it would not be signed until this point was included.
Finally, this matter is reflected in the agreement as “reduction of working hours without salary reduction”although without specifying how will be carried out or if it fulfills Díaz’s request to approve via decree the 37.5 hours per week by the year 2024.
Since July 23, both forces have shown their intention to re-establish the coalition, but Sumar has put a series of conditions on the table, prioritizing the reduction of working hours, the development of a permanent bank tax and the increased cost of dismissal, which was left out of the labor reform and which Díaz now wants to recover through the “restorative” dismissal modeladapting compensation to the personal circumstances of each worker.
PP reaction
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The popular ones have not been slow to react to the pact and have done so with irony. Sources from the PP have “valued” Díaz’s negotiating ability, “who until the last moment has shown herself to be inflexible and totally willing to stop being vice president and join the opposition as long as she does not give up her iron principles and they prevail.” in his pact with the socialists”.
Thus, Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s party insists that the president of Congress, Francina Armengol, must now set the date for the investiture session. “The PP allows itself to remember that, Although the date was set for Feijóo in real time, it has not been determined for Sánchez 21 days later“, point out the same sources, who accuse the socialist candidate for not having intervened in the failed investiture of his leader and for having “vetoed” the presence of the ministers in the debate on the amnesty in the Senate.