I don’t like the concept of ‘historic debt’ with which the State’s grievance with Catalonia refers: I prefer to speak of central government liability debit towards all citizens its inability to better fit Catalonia’s relationship within Spain. And it is that those who usually say that they govern for the whole of the population, and not only for their own, it is still time for them to say what they do for the thousands of disaffected Catalans, contrary to a situation that is perpetuated by both parties. Meanwhile, the aspiration of one party to recover the resources that he thinks he has merited before the other, who denies it or looks the other way, is identified as that debt.
Without putting a specific date on it, the debt is described as ‘historical’ to show time and patience, at the cost of willingly determining its quantification. In any case, the idea of historical debt is an imported concept; I would say that on the part of the Andalusians, and not so much in relation to their fiscal deficits (they have a surplus) but because of its poor regional development, from years of feeling “forgotten”, as if all the blame for this was external; as if the cause were the public sector and not a productive system that they themselves have neglected.
To talk about debt we have to first identify an obligation, either by a known legal link, a contract or the willingness to accept the obligated charge. There is no legal bond when a party does not recognize that obligation and a judge does not rule it. The historical debt to which some appeal from the State to Catalonia is usually related to the unfair regional financing, forgetting that the referent of the fiscal balance must also include the drain that the State makes discretionally from its own powers and resources on the territory: money collected that is never returned to Catalonia. But the central government does not recognize any obligation derived from this, nor does any judge (Constitutional Court) rule on it. Quite the contrary, due to that of the normative hierarchy (an organic law of financing ‘shouted’ from the Spanish Constitution itself that prevails a status, also confronting an organic law and also endorsed, but even so considered of lower rank so that the third additional provision of the Statute cannot oblige compliance with maintaining a level of investment by the State at the level of the Catalan GDP, as unilaterally stated in that Provision. Thus, the idea of ’historical debt’ is neither a typified obligation nor is it taxable before the courts, making that concept just a claim, a vindictive ‘hashtag’ without virtuality.
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I do understand, however, that beyond what is legal, the central government shows with Catalonia a debit of responsibility, and if it is a cause of debt, we all suffer it together. Acting as the State does (state powers and their lack of execution are the main cause of the fiscal deficit), it deprives the Spanish economy of the proper functioning of one of its most powerful engines. Infrastructure deficits, railway disaster, refusal to share headquarters and institutional powers, lack of support for that country’s good talent so that it can be excellent and thus be able to compete within Europe and the rest of the world… Not having the knowledge of the best in favor of supposed territorial rebalancing or ideological biases of the most exclusive Spanish nationalism It is the great debt of responsibility that the State has with Catalonia, and by extension with the rest of Spaniards who also see their well-being curtailed. Unlike the alleged debt of both concrete and imprecise amounts, the latter is a silent debit, which is not seen as much. With equally devastating effects; as well as as a consequence of harming and not favoring knowledge; to seek egalitarian political gain where the excellence of the most efficient would have to prevail and open migration in the most prepared clusters and not favor institutional territorial confinements in favor of a supposed territorial balance.
If the taxes paid by the Catalans are solely and exclusively from the State, which assigns them discretionally according to the needs that it estimates of each territory, let’s forget about the fiscal pact. This behavior of the State is in fact consistent with the notion of sole fiscal sovereignty, of the idea that there are no Catalans but Spaniards who live in Catalonia, typical of exclusive Spanish nationalism. If this is how the Eighth Title of the Constitution is understood, without sharing any significant sovereignty on the income side, we stop talking about ‘Spain, a federal country’. And it is that ‘federal’ comes from ‘foedus’, which means pact, and only when it is agreed can an obligation be born that entails a debt.