The vice-president and Minister of Labor started the campaign on Thursday in A Coruña and, during the short stopover she made in Madrid before heading to Zaragoza, Valencia and Seville, she spoke to La Vanguardia about her electoral program and the possibilities to revalidate the progressive coalition government.
There is controversy with his pronouncements on Catalonia. There are even those who say that their position differs from that of the commoners.
Catalonia needs us to reactivate the dialogue table in 2024 to reach an agreement and for the agreement to be voted on by Catalans. And I commit, by 2024, not only to reactivate this table, but to make the agreement possible. Fix it, I just started the campaign in Galicia and we wanted to start it in Galician, while Ada Colau made the intervention in Catalan, and we did it simply because from Sumar we defend a country of countries, a diverse, multi-national country. Sumar understands that it is essential to reactivate the dialogue table in 2024 to achieve an agreement that can be voted on by Catalans. And in this position is all Sumar.
Does Sumar support the right to self-determination?
Sumar subscribes to what I just told you: reactivate the dialogue table and reach an agreement. So let’s have an agreement, a majority agreement, which I think is what we need, must be voted on by the Catalans. This is key. Does anyone think that if there is a Vox and Feijóo government we will improve relations between Catalonia and Spain? I do not think so. When I say I commit to doing it, it’s because I know it’s okay and it’s possible. I promise to do it.
The Prosecutor’s Office has asked Judge Llarena to reactivate the Euroorder. Are you in favor of the former president being arrested?
I am in favor of respecting the law in force and, of course, court rulings, whether we share them or not. But above all that, once and for all, we do what I said: dialogue, dialogue and dialogue. Reactivate the table, take it seriously and reach a political agreement that can be voted on.
The universal inheritance for young people has received criticism, its redistributive capacity is doubted and its finalist meaning: training, employment or entrepreneurship is criticized.
Sumar respects the youth of our country and it is the first time that from a political space we take seriously the serious problem of youth, which is the lack of equal opportunities. It is the main cause of inequality in Spain. Young people have difficulties in being able to start a business. And entrepreneurship cannot depend on surnames. If someone wants to set up a photography studio or a bookstore, they should be able to do so. And, two, there is inequality in education today. The child of a worker faces enormous difficulties. Of the 18% of young people who drop out of university education, half do so because of a lack of resources. Even I am an example: if I had wanted to be a labor inspector, I would not have been able to prepare for three to five years, I could not afford it. And universal inheritance guarantees us that there will be no State spaces reserved for the children of certain families.
And why universal?
Because the children of Botín or Amancio Ortega are very few. It must work exactly like public health. The success of public health is that Amancio Ortega’s daughter and I go there. The success of public education is that we all have to go there. It is where we are socially equal and do not segregate. I think that they use somewhat outdated concepts and a poor understanding of what the public sphere should exist for. There are those who think it is only for the vulnerable. We think not. We are moving towards a project of a country of shared prosperity, of shared progress. The redistribution is done through public revenues, taxes: it is the large incomes that must support equal opportunities in our country. Remember what Fraga Iribarne said: public health was the one you went to when you had a severe problem. Here is social equalization.
One of its star measures is the reduction of working hours. Do you see employers ready for the pact, considering that there are employers who say that we retire at 70?
Yes, I think the pact is possible. For one reason: in collective agreements, very few nowadays agree on a 40-hour working week. This is why we are committed to reducing the working day by law without salary reduction to 37.5 hours in six months, to undertake a process of social dialogue and reach, within the legislature, 32 hours. Why will the Spanish employers enter the debate? Because they know that productivity increases, because the old formulas based on presence, in strenuous hours, do not work. And because with Sumar unpaid overtime will end. For example, when I arrived at the ministry there were six million overtime hours a week. With the action of the labor inspection, we are at three million a week. The day we have today is from 1983. We must keep moving forward. And you told me that the employer holds…
… Retirement…
… At 70 years old, yes. I am worried that the PSOE will not refuse to open the debate. And here I want to be clear: Sumar defends that someone who climbs a scaffold, a cleaner, a cashier, people who work in teaching and many other groups cannot work from the age of 65. And I call on pensioners to come out and defend the public pension system, which is the heart, the jewel of welfare in our country.
You talk about universalizing more health rights: mental health, oral health, ophthalmology… Can it be done without the participation of the communities?
This question is very important. First we must put an end to the shameful precariousness of healthcare professionals. Add defense for the public administration, especially health and education, the same reform that we have done in the world of private work, with the labor reform. It is indecency that we have healthcare professionals who chain monthly contracts or weekly contracts. Then, we defend a public pharmaceutical agency, because the biggest health expenditure is the pharmacy. On the other hand, the subterfuges of the autonomous communities to privatize services will end. We are talking about a plan to privatize public health. And there is a very clear way of indirect privatization called waiting lists. We have 800,000 people pending interventions. 22% have been on the waiting list for more than six months. It is the gateway to private healthcare. We will make a law that regulates waiting lists as a subjective right and, therefore, citizens will have the right to be intervened immediately. We will incorporate a public and transparent register in which each citizen can see who precedes him and who succeeds him. How will we extend the rights? Of course, with the competition of the autonomous communities, but we will incorporate them into the portfolio of services as a subjective right. Equity will work throughout the system. This is what the elections of July 23 are about.
There are many investments in their program. They have announced a new tax on large fortunes, but how deep will their tax reform go?
This is also the heart of the Sumar movement, economic democracy. In this country there is a deep fiscal injustice, there is privilege and there is chessing of those who have more resources. Sumar’s big bet to have a robust and broad welfare state is a comprehensive reform of public revenues. It is profoundly unfair that 85% of income tax revenue comes from salary income. This will end. We will make capital income the most taxed. There are two big loopholes in corporate tax, allowances and deductions, which make it a big gruyere cheese and allow a large corporation to pay 3.9%, while a hair salon or a bookstore does it at 17.5 %. We want a much broader tax on large fortunes and we want to rework the taxes of the oligopolies, which are fundamentally distribution, energy and the financial sector. The bank has just distributed 32,000 million in pre-tax profits. It is deeply unfair.
They have announced two million houses for rent in ten years in a country with three and a half million empty houses.
No, no. We also talk about the census of empty homes and how to act on it. They are complementary measures. First, what we need immediately is to limit the price of leases. It is key, because, along with unemployment, it is the main problem for families. Prices must be limited. I am very sorry that the PSOE has not extended the rent moratorium for another six months.
The polls say that the internal tension of the last year has had a serious cost in votes.
Of the surveys or polls, I only consider the trends they indicate and what they say about the problems of citizens. Polls have been telling us for a long time that there is huge disaffection, higher than in 2015, and so we have been stubborn about turning politics into a useful project for citizens. Citizens don’t want us to talk about ourselves. He doesn’t like noise. That’s what all the polls say. Sumar is the upheaval, the decisive force to guarantee a progressive government. Let’s play with it for the next decade.
