Sánchez looks at Italy and achieves a large absolute majority for his anti-crisis plan

In Moncloa today they looked askance at Italy, where the almighty Mario Draghi has finally had to throw in the towel by not being able to save his anti-crisis plan, to highlight Pedro Sánchez's ability to forge parliamentary majorities with which to maintain the legislature at float in Spain and try to rearm in the face of the inflationary gale and the dark clouds of recession that appear on the horizon.

Thomas Osborne
Thomas Osborne
16 July 2022 Saturday 11:01
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Sánchez looks at Italy and achieves a large absolute majority for his anti-crisis plan

In Moncloa today they looked askance at Italy, where the almighty Mario Draghi has finally had to throw in the towel by not being able to save his anti-crisis plan, to highlight Pedro Sánchez's ability to forge parliamentary majorities with which to maintain the legislature at float in Spain and try to rearm in the face of the inflationary gale and the dark clouds of recession that appear on the horizon.

“It is time to seek consensus, to agree on what is essential, it is time to join the collective effort,” Minister Félix Bolaños has demanded. And, once the coalition between the PSOE and United We Can be cohesive and the majority of the investiture recomposed thanks to the impact of the measures that Sánchez announced on Tuesday –particularly the new taxes on extraordinary profits from banks and electricity companies–, the Government has managed to gather a large absolute majority to validate its second anti-crisis decree and extend the previous one.

Up to 186 yeses have therefore endorsed the tax reduction of the electricity bill or the check of 200 euros for the most vulnerable people. This time, already with the favorable vote of Esquerra, together with the PNV, EH Bildu, the PDECat, the Canarian Coalition or Más País and Compromís.

The surprise, which was not expected in the Government, is that on this occasion Alberto Núñez Feijóo's PP has also facilitated the validation of the anti-crisis decree, by going from rejecting the first plan to abstaining in it. Ciudadanos or Junts have also abstained, and the extreme right of Vox has been left alone at no.

After a long day of negotiations in which the telephones have smoked in parallel to the parliamentary debate - "there has been a lot of work", they have sighed relieved in the leadership of the socialist group -, the Government has achieved an even higher absolute majority, of 187 votes, for his new express reform of the organic law of the Judiciary with which to renew the Constitutional Court. The Democratic Memory Law has also been approved with 173 votes in favor, in this case with the abstention of ERC and the furious rejection of some rights that have warned that they will repeal it as soon as they arrive at Moncloa.

Despite the repeated frictions in the government coalition, the growing misgivings of the legislature's allies and the harsh offensive of the right-wing, Sánchez has managed to approve, and without any narrowness, all the initiatives that have been voted on in Congress. For the Government, it has been the best climax to the three days of the debate on the state of the nation and to close the parliamentary course with an image of political stability with which to try to face the economic storms that may intensify even more around the turn of the summer. “We came out reinforced”, they celebrated.

Therefore, and in two key votes, the PP has also appeared on the list of support for Sánchez. The first, in a tactical move, has come in the form of abstention from the Government's second decree of economic measures. Despite understanding that the plan presented by the chief executive is still "insufficient and incomplete" as it lacks, among others, "specific measures for the middle classes", such as deflating the personal income tax rate for income of less than 40,000 euros, PP sources have valued "positively" the fact that Sánchez has rectified his position regarding the reduction of VAT on electricity.

And the second has been limited to the increase in defense spending to which the Prime Minister promised during the last NATO summit held in Madrid. The PP initially requested "a financing law with multi-year programming", but has accepted the PSOE's amendment to its resolution to progressively raise this item to 2% of GDP.

In return, the PSOE has promised to support the complete document of the popular on Foreign Policy and Defense to "strengthen the relationship with the United States and support the expansion of the US military contingent at the Rota base in Cadiz."

In Moncloa, however, they rule out that Feijóo has given a twist to his opposition strategy, with abstention from the anti-crisis decree, and rather attribute it to a lack of position in the face of measures that they consider to be beneficial for all citizens. “They are totally misplaced”, they have settled.