The PSC’s proposal to limit and even eliminate the financial compensation and life pension to the former presidents of the Parliament once they retire does not seem to have any problems moving forward. A priori, the debate will be about what new conditions are established rather than whether it should be deleted or not. ERC has shown itself willing to study the initiative, making it clear that it will not oppose it. Even so, it demands that it be extended to other legislative chambers, both state and regional.
The common people also see it well and it is even difficult for other groups such as Vox, the CUP, Ciudadanos or the PP to reject it, if they do not see tacticism in the socialists. The campaign for the municipal elections has been underway for weeks. The context is also important: the TSCJ ruling on the current president Laura Borràs is awaiting for an alleged case of prevarication and documentary falsification when she led the Institució de les Lletres Catalanes (ILC). Junts, for its part, has warned that if it is done ad hoc they will not take the PSC proposal into consideration.
Esquerra’s position is especially significant if one takes into account that up to three former Parliament presidents are from his ranks and despite the fact that some of them have not yet benefited from these economic rewards: Ernest Benach, Carme Forcadell and Roger Torrent.
Marta Vilalta, spokesperson for the Republicans, has assured that they will study the proposal carefully. “But it is imperative that this reconsideration be done in all chambers, both those of the State and in other territories. Otherwise it would be a very partial proposal,” warned the also deputy general secretary of ERC, making it clear, in any case, that ” It is not a condition, but an invitation”.
“We are willing to study it and see what the update on salary and pension supplements has to be, but let’s do it globally,” Vilalta insisted. And as JxCat has warned that “any reform should not be done thinking of specific cases, but in the interest of defending the institutions and their prestige. Let’s broaden the focus.”
On the initiative of the socialists, in Junts they are willing to listen to the proposals that come to them, but they condition their role in this matter to there being “broad consensus” and “a serious and rigorous debate.” “Any reform of these issues must be addressed from consensus and with the aim of giving prestige and streamlining the institutions, also fleeing from political opportunism”, stated the spokesman and vice-president of the formation, Josep Rius, at the subsequent press conference to the management meeting.
“If it is an ad hoc reform [as a result of the judicial situation of Laura Borràs], they will not find us,” however, the JxCat spokesman warned. Last week several groups already considered the possibility of modifying the current legislation so that former presidents of the Parliament who have convictions for crimes related to corruption do not receive these benefits.
For their part, in the PSC they insist that it is not a measure “against anyone or for any specific case”, in reference to Borràs, and they do not close the door on the fact that this same reform can be applied to the regime of the presidents of the Generalitat, who can also enjoy allowances after termination and life pensions once they reach 65 years of age. Salvador Illa’s party has two living former presidents of the Generalitat: Pasqual Maragall and José Montilla, however, the Socialists believe it is necessary to focus for the moment on the case of the presidents of the Parliament due to the “institutional crisis” affecting the Catalan Chamber .
The PSC will give more details of its proposal this Tuesday in an appearance by parliamentary spokesperson Alícia Romero, but this Monday, the party’s spokeswoman, Elia Rortolero, has indicated that the benefits that former presidents of Parliament can receive “have become outdated” because the circumstances that gave meaning to the law that protects them “have changed notably.” Nor is there “justification”, according to the Socialists, for “a special pension regime for their widowed spouses”. “Doing useful politics is being exemplary,” Tortolero remarked.
