The negotiating teams of the Government and the PSC have met for four hours this morning to try to seal an agreement for the 2023 budget. The meeting has ended with both parties bringing positions closer and with the feeling that the agreement is a matter of little time. From the Executive of Pere Aragonès they point out that the talks are on the “good track to close the fringes”. The Catalan socialists point in the same direction, although they clarify that these issues that remain to be resolved "are not minor."
The meeting took place in the Palau de la Generalitat. On behalf of the Government, the Minister of the Presidency, Laura Vilagrà, the Head of Economy, Natàlia Mas and the general secretaries of both departments have participated. The PSC has Alicia Romero, Jordi Riba, Nelia Martínez and Jordi Terrades.
The positions are getting closer after ERC will agree to take over the construction of the section of the B-40 with which the Socialists became strong. From the Government, the differences on this road have been pointing out for days as the only obstacle that prevented them from shaking hands with the PSC:
This noon, the spokesperson for the Republicans, Marta Vilalta, has admitted that the decision on the B-40 or fourth belt "is painful", but before "a majority" that defends the project "either this was done or there were no budgets". “ERC thinks of the collective interest instead of the individual (…). We have had to assume something that we do not defend," said the Republican.
The PSC continues to ensure that there are still pending issues. One of them, the future of El Prat airport. Despite the fact that from the Republican ranks they emphasize that there is no impediment, those of Salvador Illa want the Government to commit to studying an extension, a term that until today is not clearly stated in the written commitment.
The Socialists have once again valued and thanked "the significant gesture" that meant for them that ERC voted last week in favor of the execution of the B-40 in Parliament, but it is also true that the Republicans abstained on the point of the motion of the PSC regarding the expansion of the airport infrastructure.
In any case, the talks seem to be going in the right direction based on the length of the meeting this Monday morning, but they insist on emphasizing that "there is still no closed agreement." The PSC spokesperson, Elia Tortolero, has emphasized the "fringes" that still remain to be resolved and her party's willingness to agree.
In any case, discretion has been imposed in what is surely the last hours of the negotiation before there is a closed agreement. The Socialists have been especially zealous with the content of the conversations and beyond general impressions they do not go into details about them.
Waiting for the future of these negotiations, in another party that would allow with its votes to approve the Government's accounts, En Comú Podem, has once again shown its disagreement with the swallowing of ERC with the B-40, to which can be added the airport and the Hard Rock, among other matters. The spokesman for the commons and deputy in Congress, Joan Mena, has once again demanded that the PSC "stop making the partridge dizzy" with the budgets, at the same time that he has asked the Government "to get its act together" to overcome this situation lock.
The commons have already made it clear that although it is "hard for them to understand ERC's change of opinion" with the B-40, "which has disappointed many people", they will not back away from the budget agreement they already have with the Executive of Pere Aragonès, but Mena, candidate of the formation for the mayoralty of Sabadell, has celebrated the mobilizations in the Vallès in response to this change of position of ERC: "They are a first warning for those who want to listen to them," he pointed out.
