The organizational chaos in the exams that more than 13,500 applicants for a civil service position in Catalonia experienced this weekend has generated the umpteenth clash between the Government and the opposition over efficiency in public management. PSC, Junts y el Ejecutivo and ERC have spent months confronting each other about their respective deficiencies in the administration of public affairs, which covers folders as diverse as drought, infrastructure, public transport, social services, European funds or education, among others.
The organization of these exams has served as ammunition for socialists and post-convergents to discredit the management capacity of the Government. "A Government that does not know how to organize an opposition is not the most appropriate to lead a country," attacked yesterday the leader of the opposition and the PSC, Salvador Illa. But the dart is preceded by others from the ERC to the Socialists due to issues such as the drought or the deficiencies that the Rodalies service still carries in Catalonia.
"Self-requirement" is what Illa demands with every criticism of the ERC Government, which in recent months has emphasized that "what depends on the PSC and the PSOE is a disaster in terms of management, as we see every day in Suburbs". The explicit denunciation of the deputy general secretary of ERC, Marta Vilalta, on account of the closing of the Canal de Urgell is modeled on those poured out by the president of the party, Orio Junqueras in the last few days, marked, without a doubt, by the electoral concurrence of 28-M.
On this occasion, Junqueras had no choice but to express his "maximum confidence in the Government and in the actions it can take" in this regard. But the union of civil servants IAC-CATAC denounces that there is still no detailed information on the guarantees of the process and demanded the resignation of "those who have the highest responsibility and should have been the guarantors of the entire process."
The management of the public has become a fight between both parties, which are disputing in these elections a good piece of the cake and their future aspirations for the presidency of the Generalitat. The guest artist in this case is JxCat, the first to request the appearance of the Councilor of the Presidency, Laura Vilagrà, who assumed the responsibilities of the public function after the departure of the post-convergents of the Government - the Vice President Jordi Puigneró was a councilor of Digital Policies and Public Administration-.
Junts has joined the fight to show who is the best manager, especially in the field of powers that he held when he was in the coalition government, such as foreign policy, the economy - making a dent in the fiscal deficit suffered by Catalonia and which ERC does not seem for the work of continually denouncing-, or in the drought, where JxCat has an interest in defending its municipal domain.
The Government's explanations for what happened in these exams do not seem to have satisfied the unions, which have once again attacked the Executive of Pere Aragonès for having “privatized” the organization of the tests by hiring an external company for it. The fact that this company hired another for part of the service only aggravates the feeling of lack of control over the organization.
The general secretary of the UGT, Camil Ros, has demanded "solutions" for those affected. In his opinion, "it is time for solutions and not for resignations." Ros and the general secretary of CC.OO., Javier Pacheco, have criticized that the Government chose to outsource the management of the tests, something that in their opinion is not very left-wing. “The private management of services is not more efficient, as some want to suggest. Private management wants to do business," Pacheco remarked.
The mayoress of Barcelona, Ada Colau, has regretted what happened but took the opportunity to set herself as an example by recalling that in the municipal sphere of Barcelona it is the city council itself that organizes these exams and that they are not outsourced to a private company, as is the case in the Generalitat .
The controversy over what happened in the oppositions comes at the right time for the opposition, at the gates of May Day, Labor Day, where the Socialists have brought out their entire arsenal of achievements in this area during the lengthy government legislature of Pedro Sánchez, with special attention to a labor reform that Congress approved without the support of ERC, they recall. Along with this, the reform of pensions, the minimum wage, scholarships, the minimum vital income, the housing law...
