The mayor of Barcelona, ??the socialist Jaume Collboni, wants to have his own budgets approved for 2024 in April and, given the lack of support to carry out his accounts, he could be subject to a question of trust. This is clear from the appearance made this Wednesday by Collboni himself in the Saló de Cent of the City Hall.
The PSC minority government already tried to approve the budgets for this year at the end of 2023, but that attempt did not succeed as it did not have the support of any opposition group. Last year’s accounts, the last of Ada Colau’s mandate, were immediately extended. This circumstance blocks many of the planned investments. Given this situation, Collboni has decided to take the 2024 accounts to an extraordinary commission next March 20.
The most likely thing is that the commission will rule unfavorably on the Collboni government’s project and that it will call an extraordinary plenary session at the beginning of March and link the approval of the budgets to a question of confidence. A period of 30 days would then be opened for the opposition groups to reach an agreement and present a candidate for mayor, something unlikely at this moment given the correlation of forces in the City Council. After that period, Collboni’s budgets would be automatically approved at the beginning of April, in the spring, as the mayor had promised.
If in the coming days the PSC does not obtain the necessary support, Collboni will be forced into one avenue, that of the question of confidence, which is not the first time that it has been used to approve municipal budgets. Previously, Xavier Trias did it in 2013, and Ada Colau in 2017 and 2018.
With this maneuver, Mayor Collboni could fulfill his wish to have budgets in spring and, in addition, he would gain time to continue negotiating the incorporation of some political force to his minority government. At this time, the option most likely to succeed is a pact with ERC, which would not give Collboni an absolute majority but would allow him to have more troops to govern the city.
In his appearance, Collboni did not explicitly mention the issue of trust, although he insisted on appealing to the “responsibility” and “coherence” of the opposition groups. He reminded them that the City Council, as a consequence of the increase in resources from State collection, will be able to have 71 million euros more than those originally planned. He has also warned them that “not having a budget means not having 715 million euros to execute.”
Jaume Collboni has explained the reasons why it is necessary for Barcelona to have budgets as soon as possible. He has made reference to the good economic indicators of the city, to the arrival of important investments and to the modification of the works schedule to shorten the execution of projects such as the reform of the Rambla.
Likewise, he has listed a series of municipal projects that have recently been approved in commission or in plan with the support of various opposition groups. This is the case, for example, of the coverage of the Ronda de Dalt, of the urbanization of the surroundings of the old Mercat del Peix to develop the Ciutadella del Coneixement; the modification of the General Metropolitan Plan in Camp de l’Arpa and El Clot; the special plan for the land of the old Mercedes factory or the air conditioning plan for primary schools.
Collboni has insisted that Barcelona has the resources to carry out many projects and that “the city cannot miss any opportunity.” “We have resources to face many challenges,” he said in reference to housing policies, the reinforcement of the educational system and primary health care, the reduction of inequalities by reinforcing the neighborhood plan, the fight against change climate or continue working on the good maintenance of public space.
The mayor of Barcelona did not want to directly link the City Council’s budgets to the possible alliances to approve the forecast of 2024 accounts in the Generalitat and the State, but he has admitted that there is a favorable climate for three-way agreements.
Collboni has also adopted the Simeone philosophy when he was asked if an agreement for the budgets would be linked to a government pact that would allow him to expand his team (now it is only 10 councilors in a city council with 41 councillors). The Atlético de Madrid coach has made a fortune with his “game by game”. The mayor of Barcelona hopes to do it “step by step.”
