The Parliament approved on Thursday a national pact to protect the Catalan school against “systematic attacks by the State”. It is a position that fits with the notice that Pere Aragonès (Pineda de Mar, 1982) launched shortly after the municipal elections, given the possibility that PP and Vox would take over the government. The president is above all concerned with issues in the field of education, while addressing current political events. With an outstanding fact: he assures that neither the lack of new budgets nor the bad results of ERC in the general elections will advance the elections.
What will the Government’s relations with Moncloa be like if the PP and Vox rule from July 23?
Let me say that the relationship with the PSOE government and Unidas Podemos has not been easy. We have a significant list of breaches. Whatever happens in the elections, Catalonia and everything it stands for must be defended: the welfare state, the Catalan language and culture, the institutions, as well as the political future of this country. Catalonia’s defense lines will have to be reinforced. The PP and Vox have been warning us. They are saying that Catalonia will be the enemy to beat.
You took it for granted two days after the municipal elections that there would be a PP-Vox government. Is it now just a possibility?
The one who took it for granted was Pedro Sánchez, who is calling elections to try to change the situation. It’s a posibility. We have to be prepared for all circumstances. The best defense that can be made of Catalonia on July 23 is from the independence movement, and from the independent and progressive positions.
Gabriel Rufián speaks of a great PP-PSOE coalition. Do you believe it?
It is not disposable. Seven years ago, Rajoy was sworn in as Prime Minister with the abstention of the PSOE.
But it was not to form a PP-PSOE government
There are many ways to govern and great coalitions: it can be de facto, with external support, or a great coalition sharing government. But the PSOE cannot ask for a vote to defend Catalonia against the extreme right, because between Madrid and Catalonia they always end up choosing the interests of the State.
If you want to defend Catalonia, shouldn’t you also have the commons and the PSC?
Only with a great result from the independence movement, and especially from the ERC, will we have the guarantee that the defense will take place. In matters of school, housing or anti-repression, Sánchez has made decisions thanks to the influence and pressure that the republican independence movement has had. Because he presented himself with another speech and after a failed inauguration that he wanted to do with Albert Rivera, he said that the sentences of political prisoners had to be fully served, and he appeared in a campaign full of Spanish flags . Then he changed. And not by divine grace, but thanks to negotiation and ERC’s ability to turn it around.
On housing issues, Unidas Podemos was much more influential.
The scheme of the main novelty, which is the rental price cap, is copied from the Ester Capella law that we made in Catalonia and that the PSOE took to the Constitutional Court.
Let’s get back to it. Don’t you think that in order to “defend Catalonia” sectors beyond the independence movement would have to be incorporated?
Evidently. The great strength that we have in Catalonia to defend the language, the school model, self-government, the right to decide are the great consensus. We have done so before the ruling of the TSJC on 25% of Spanish in schools.
Does he foresee disobedience for issues such as language?
What I foresee is victory.
Do you think there is a part of the independence movement that expects PP and Vox to win, because of the worst, the best thing?
I think that when worse, worse. Nor does it mean that the current government can come out with an approval. But PP and Vox represent a much greater degree of hostility than with Sánchez.
ERC asks to raise the conditions to invest Sánchez. Can you specify them?
It will be necessary to see, if the case arises, what distance Sánchez is willing to take with respect to the postulates of PP and Vox. There must be the will to advance in the resolution of the political conflict and in the anti-repressive measures and to deepen a solution that only goes through a referendum.
ERC and Junts have made a few pacts with the PSC after the municipal ones. Is the relationship with the socialists normalized?
With respect to the future of the country, we are in a totally opposite position to that of the PSC. I defend the independence of Catalonia, a referendum, and the PSC denies this democratic possibility. In other areas it has been possible to reach agreements. But as the administrations grow in importance, the national factor has more weight.
In the councils of Lleida and Tarragona ERC has agreed with the PSC.
In any case, it has been to guarantee that there are pro-independence presidencies. And in most of the municipalities in which Esquerra has reached agreements with the PSC, it is the PSC that has supported ERC.
On Wednesday it seemed that he was approaching Junts. Does it cross your mind to reincorporate JxCat into the Government?
We are at a time when it is a priority to reach agreements that are similar to those we had at the beginning of the legislature. I aspire for Junts to form part of the stability of this Government and we have to work with mechanisms that most logically go through parliamentary stability. From here, find formulas of agreement because after the next elections to the Parliament we will have to understand each other again.
If this understanding does not bear fruit, will the 2024 budget be negotiated with the PSC?
Catalonia should have maximum stability, and we will work with whoever is willing to guarantee it. Better if it is with those with whom we share points, especially with respect to the national horizon of Catalonia. What is important is that the agreements arrive. My goal is that in the next budgets we can also have the support of Junts. It would be irresponsible for us to dedicate ourselves, at a time of extremely high complexity, to seeing who leaves the ship first.
But it would also be an exercise in responsibility to call elections if there are no new budgets.
It is a scenario that we do not contemplate. We are convinced that the agreements will be reached that will guarantee that there will be the necessary stability for important decisions.
Should I insist, would you advance the elections if you do not have a new budget?
Do not insist. There will be no electoral advance.
Not even after July 23 if ERC suffers a bump again?
In no case will I subordinate the Catalan legislature to Congress. The presidents who have preceded me have not done so, because they have had the institutional sense that corresponds to a president of the Generalitat. I won’t either now. When Jordi Pujol, when his political formation had results far behind in a general election for the Socialist Party, the elections did not advance. Junts did not when ERC overtook him. In either scenario, it doesn’t make any kind of sense. If there is also a context of a hostile government in Madrid of PP and Vox, or of PP with the support of the PSOE, (we are not here to) dedicate ourselves to dismantling the defense of Catalonia and putting ourselves in an electoral scenario and of uncertain formation of a subsequent government .
He won’t do a Pedro Sánchez, so…
I am used to being quite predictable. It is a value at a time when Catalonia needs stability and that the legislatures are completed.
In the municipal elections ERC lost 300,000 votes. Because?
It is a bad result. We would have to analyze the exceptional result of 2019 to better understand that of 2023. In 2019 there was a very high electoral mobilization, when we had imprisoned leaders.
Do you attribute the poor results to the negotiation with the PSOE or to the management of the Government?
Going into percentages here would be a reckless venture. The results are not due to a single cause. In 2019, many positive elements came together, which ended up crystallizing in extraordinarily good results, the best we have ever had. Now we have the second best.
Has it not influenced the fact that the dialogue table has focused on undoing the judicial consequences of the events of 2017 and has not advanced in the objective of the referendum?
When we started the negotiation process, we explained that it had two phases. A first that was essential: change the effects of repression. There were some pardons, we repealed sedition and today a Spanish government cannot threaten to apply sedition to us if we decide to move towards independence. The second phase is the one that must be faced from now on, which is the basic resolution of the conflict. That is why I have proposed a clarity agreement. This phase has to address the root of the problem and it will be much more difficult.
Let’s talk about the management of the Government. A recent report says that Catalonia is moving away from the goals of renewable energy. How can you recover?
We are recovering. Since November 2021 we have gone from 9 megawatts of authorized power to more than 1,500, and in July we will reach 1,600 megawatts. We have taken a very big leap, but we must continue.
But the procedures take too long…
We will delve into its simplification. We allocated 59 million euros to public energy to convert all the roofs of the public buildings of the Generalitat into photovoltaic energy production plants. There has been an inflection. And we have 5,000 more megawatts in the pipeline.
They said no to the expansion of the El Prat airport that the PSOE government proposed. But we still don’t know what the Generalitat’s project for the airport is.
We set ourselves the goal of increasing intercontinental connections. It is not an extension to increase the number of tourists, which is what Núñez Feijóo said in Barcelona. It is not necessary to increase the quantity, but the value. We have an agreement resulting from the 2023 budgets by which it is said that there will be a joint State-Generalitat commission, which I trust will be launched in September. But a Barcelona airport managed from Madrid by Aena will always benefit Madrid.
But when will the Generalitat present its proposal?
When it is feasible to carry out the negotiation with the State.
Catalonia dedicates 3.8% of GDP to Education, below the Spanish average. When can we reach the 6% requested through an ILP in Parliament?
Citizens cannot be fooled. We will only be able to allocate the resources needed by the public services of our country in education or health when we can have all of them. And that will be when we are an independent state. With limited autonomy and fiscal plunder that affects 8% of the wealth that is produced in Catalonia every year, to think that it is possible to allocate all the resources is to be out of reality.
But Catalonia is one of the autonomous communities with the least investment according to GDP.
We have gone from a budget in Education that was a little more than 5,000 million euros to 6,900 million in 2023. It is not worth it for me to look at the weight of public spending over GDP if we do not look at the weight of income from the Generalitat on the GDP. These are determined by what the State sends us. Therefore, the fiscal deficit hits us every day, and we have fewer resources than we should.
What can be improved then in the field of Education?
We have lowered the ratios in I3 and I4 with a maximum of 20 students per teacher, we have introduced free education in I2, we have deployed the inclusive school or the advancement of the school year. We have to consolidate it. Now a new stage is needed with Minister Anna Simó, which must be characterized by trust with the entire educational community. The main challenge is how we reduce school dropout…
It is at 17%, double that in the EU…
That is why we are reinforcing professional training. In fact, of the 1,500 education professionals that we approved to join this Tuesday, half are destined to improve the offer of professional training.
Is it a failure of the Catalan school model that the reading comprehension of Catalan students has dropped to only being above Ceuta and Melilla?
It would be wrong diagnosis. Catalan society has faced very important changes in recent years. Demographic changes that represent a very big challenge due to the incorporation of a large number of citizens who have come to our country. In the first decade of this century, a million people arrived. A challenge in terms of incorporation, of language learning, in the educational field.
How are the promised aids for municipalities to carry out works to take advantage of water in times of drought?
We seek that the smallest municipalities, which have less investment capacity, can have support that in some cases will be 100% of the works. As the municipalities increase in population volume and have more investment capacity, the percentage will reach 60-70%. It is the responsibility of the municipalities, but the Government is there to help.
