Mayor Jaume Collboni is increasing the pressure on the opposition groups to approve the municipal budget proposal as soon as possible, next week if possible. But everything points to the issue being resolved in a very different way. Suddenly, yesterday at noon, the people from Junts and BComú found the ball on their roof and they all told Mayor Collboni that things don’t work like this, that he must first decide with whom he shares the executive and what policies it wants to develop, and then embody them in a budget.
Given the latest circumstances, the question of trust as a mechanism for approving City Council budgets now does nothing but win points. Step by step, is Collboni’s new slogan and wildcard answer, which in this way neither confirms nor denies a procedure that seemed inexorable as the hours progressed yesterday. Very few in Sant Jaume know how to improvise with as much flair as the mayor.
The socialist’s last move was staged at noon in the City Hall’s Saló de Cent. The most solemn dependence of the Consistory was large enough to host the mayor’s last press conference. Collboni wanted to give a very institutional air to a rather political announcement. And when the appearance ended, they even played the piece of music that usually accompanies the municipal authorities here on the most special occasions, such as the reading of the Mercè proclamation, for example.
And in this way Collboni said that today’s government commission will approve the PSC’s well-known municipal budget proposal, more or less the same one that was already rejected by the opposition, and that he hopes that this time the rest of municipal groups to give the green light to these accounts in an extraordinary Economy committee that will take place next Tuesday in order for them to be definitively approved at the municipal meeting in March.
In this way, Collboni would fulfill one of the major objectives already declared months ago, that Barcelona have new accounts in the spring and stop extending the last budget of former mayoress Ada Colau. Collboni’s goals, already declared months ago, also include setting up a coalition government with more room for manoeuvre. At the moment, the municipal executive only has the ten councilors added by the PSC.
And from the podium, the mayor wanted to call on the opposition to take responsibility, because although the main novelty of the accounts again put on the table is an increase in income of 2% which so far has not was planned, at the moment Barcelona is entering a new situation, the city is bubbling and an administration that does not reinforce growth and that is not in a position to squeeze resources to alleviate such urgent problems, such as access to housing. “We are losing opportunities”, said the mayor. “We are letting a few trains pass,” he hinted.
In addition, although Collboni assured that Barcelona will never be a bargaining chip in any negotiation, he also said that it was necessary to take advantage of the fact that at the moment the budgets of the State and the Generalitat are also being negotiated. Apparently, the planets have never been more aligned than they are now.
But the main opposition groups were not intimidated either by the mayor’s calls for responsibility or by the crucial nature of the current situation or by the planetary alignment. Things would have to change a lot for the opposition to support Collboni’s accounts in just a week. That is why the question of trust is now emerging with increasing clarity as the most plausible way to approve municipal budgets.
Those from Junts and those from BComú raised their eyebrows in unison yesterday, each in their own way. All of them hastened to point out that they do not see the convenience of putting back on the table some bills that were already rejected, that what the socialists must do is decide on one side or the other, establish a a government with a very wide base and margin of maneuver that sets clear political objectives that in the end have just been defined and made concrete in municipal budgets that are not the ones currently on the table.
According to Junts and BComú, their spokespersons, Jordi Martí Galbis and Janet Sanz, Collboni must first decide which side he leans towards, with whom he wants to govern, with Junts or with BComú. Because both are willing to assume government responsibilities, that their electoral programs determine municipal action, and neither is willing to take advantage of the supposed weakness of the socialist executive.
Martí stressed that Collboni must decide whether to opt for the desire for change expressed by the people of Barcelona at the polls or subscribe to the recipes of the past that have already been rejected. And Sanz insisted that Barcelona needs a progressive government that consolidates the achievements of the previous mandates, and that they are concerned about the disposition of the PSC to live off the income and inheritance of Colau. Curiously, those from ERC put themselves in profile yesterday and did not take the bait. The republicans, who at the time also rejected the socialist budgets, are the ones who currently have the best chance of entering the municipal government.
But Collboni is waking up with great ease in his supposed weakness. It doesn’t need more councilors to erase graffiti, keep garbage containers in good condition and attend to many other everyday issues that greatly determine the mood of the neighborhood. That is why the question of trust seems inexorable. Twice he was asked about this question at the solemn press conference and both times he avoided answering. Step by step, he says. If in the next few days the PSC does not obtain the necessary support and the accounts are rejected in next week’s extraordinary Economy Committee, Collboni will convene an extraordinary plenary session and if he continues without support he will be forced to resort to the question of confidence . A period of 30 days would then be opened for the opposition groups to present a candidate for mayor, something unlikely, given the correlation of forces. The accounts would be automatically approved in April, as the mayor promised.
