Congress has given the go-ahead and from next Tuesday deputies will be able to carry out their duties in Catalan, Basque and Galician. They will do so now in the two plenary sessions scheduled next week, on Tuesday, September 19 and Thursday, September 21, to approve the reform of the Regulations that will precisely allow the use of co-official languages in the Lower House. This will be communicated tomorrow, Thursday, by the president of Congress, Francina Armengol, to the Board of Spokespersons.
The initiative means bringing forward by one week the initial forecasts, which pointed to the investiture debate of Alberto Núñez Feijóo, on the 26th and 27th of this month, as the date of release of Catalan, Basque and Galician in Congress. The Board has decided to advance the authorization for the use of co-official languages, once the will of the groups that will support the reform of the regulations has been confirmed.
The representatives of the PP on the Chamber Table have warned the majority of the PSOE and Sumar during the meeting that they doubt the legality of applying the reform before approving it, and that an illegality could be incurred. According to the popular ones, it could even be going against the very content of the law, if it is already in force in the plenary session called for its approval. The PP refers to the fact that an amendment to the text could be approved, which for example would postpone its entry into force by three months, and yet it would be applied in advance, which would go against the law.
The approval of the reform will be made in two extraordinary plenary sessions next week. To shorten parliamentary deadlines, as already planned, the initiative will be processed directly and in a single reading. A formula that means shortening the time in the parliamentary procedure for its approval, since it is not necessary for the initiative to be debated in the Regulations Commission, which has not yet been established.
The use of co-official languages will be allowed in all parliamentary activity, since the proposed reform affects the entire functioning of the Chamber. Deputies will be able to choose the language they want to use in all areas of their parliamentary activity, not only in oral interventions but also in the presentation of writings.
The use of Aranese will also be authorized in Congress, since the reform of the regulations provides that all languages that are official in any of the Statutes of Autonomy will be accepted, and Aranese is considered as such in that of Catalonia.
The reform of the regulations has the approval of the lawyers of Congress, according to a document that the Board sees this Wednesday. The lawyers recognize the right of deputies to use official languages other than Spanish in the Chamber, and do not object to the initiative being processed directly and in a single reading. However, they warn that in the short term it is "very difficult" to apply the use of co-official languages in all parliamentary activity, since the reform proposed for this implementation affects the "entire functioning of the Chamber."
To prepare the device in record time, Congress consulted the Senate about how its translation system is organized, parliamentary sources explain, since in the Upper House the use of co-official languages has been a reality since 2005, although with limitations. The Senate has a team of 25 translators, who are not staff but freelance, and Congress will hire those it deems appropriate from this list. It also now has the necessary headphones so that the deputies, the journalists covering the sessions and in general everyone present in the chamber can understand all the speakers. However, there will be no simultaneous translation from Aranese and if a deputy wants to use it, he will have to translate himself.
The Senate's team of translators is made up of 25 professionals, selected after an examination in 2005. Since that year, the regulations of the Upper House allow senators to use Catalan, Basque and Galician in the Commission of the Autonomous Communities. Since 2011 also in the plenary session, although only in the debate of motions.
These professionals are not staff, but provide their service externally, depending on needs and availability. Seven people are called for a plenary session in the Senate, who are organized to cover all the translation in real time from Catalan, Valencian – which are treated as different languages –, Basque and Galician into Spanish, explain sources from the Chamber.
The representatives of the PP on the Congress Board, led by the second vice president, José Antonio Bermúdez de Castro, also warned about the hiring of translators and material resources that the Lower House is supposed to be doing so that all the co-official languages can be spoken in next week's plenary session. The PP has requested a report from the legal services, to see if it is being done in accordance with the law. The hiring of people and material means requires certain administrative procedures, which according to popular opinion are not being complied with at this time, with regard to the publication of the offer, and the concurrence of several specifications.
Furthermore, the PP sources consulted point out, the text itself that is going to be approved in the plenary session in which the use of co-official languages will already be allowed, has a transitional provision that says that the Board, after hearing the Board of Spokespersons, will establish the procedure and the mechanisms to be adopted to apply the text of the law in practice, and those steps have not been completed, and the presidency of the Board is doing so unilaterally.
