Alberto Núñez Feijóo has given priority to economic analysis in his year-end balance sheet and has offered to lead a political shift in 2023. For the president of the PP, the crises that have occurred in recent years, from 2008 to now, have placed Spain in a "context of uncertainties, problems and existential questions", which is why he has applied to be the manager that, from "the highest honor of a public servant", he can provide the answers, the certainties and the solutions that the Spaniards require.
Feijóo has begun by addressing the internal crisis that the PP experienced in February, after which he himself assumed the leadership to replace Pablo Casado, with "humility, responsibility and commitment to the country." At this time, in the opinion of the conservative leader, the PP "enjoys very good health" and has given as an example the "good work" of the Andalusian government, which has allowed Juan Manuel Moreno Bonilla to obtain a "historic" absolute majority, for which has shown optimism in the face of next year's elections: "We are in a position to win in any of the autonomies", he celebrated.
Feijóo has also praised politics, the importance of which he has highlighted for what he has as a "moral obligation" to the country, and has proposed himself as an "alternative at the level of Spanish society" against the Government of Pedro Sánchez. "Spain deserves a better government," said Feijóo, who referred to the alliance between "the sanchismo and the independence movement" to describe a political action in which, in his opinion, "there is plenty of frivolity, inexperience, division, arrogance and noise", while what is needed is "rigor, seriousness, planning and orientation to the general interests in government action", something that he has summarized as "sense of State".
In this sense, Feijóo has referred to the new slogan "Advance and protect" of the Government of Spain, and has stated that these two verbs do not withstand an "objective analysis" contrasted with the Spanish reality, since Spain, he has pointed out, is " the last economy of the European Union", an argument based on the fact that "the GDP of 2019 has not recovered", unlike the other European countries. Therefore, the leader of the PP considers that the current one is a "lost legislature", since "Spain is poorer than in 2018 and is more indebted than when Sánchez came to government." In addition, unemployment, both general and youth, is the highest in the EU, he stressed, while public debt "breaks records", and in Spain it has doubled the European average.
When there are "thirteen million Spaniards at risk of poverty and four million in a situation of severe material deprivation", Feijóo stressed, one cannot speak of "protecting" citizens, who have seen the spread of inequalities in recent years and the "loss of purchasing power" of average incomes, problems for which the third anti-crisis decree of the Government, which "shows that it is overwhelmed", is not enough. "He is late and copies the proposals of the PP", Feijóo has reiterated an argument that Cuca Gamarra already expressed in his appearance on Tuesday, after the press conference in which Pedro Sánchez presented his annual balance.
"These measures are incomplete and late," insisted Feijóo, who recalled that in April he proposed a reduction in VAT on electricity and gas, which did not arrive until June and September, and that he also proposed a reduction in VAT on basic foods three months ago and so far the Government has not launched it: "It is a terrible lack of humanity and empathy to make the Spanish spend Christmas with the highest prices and without any reduction", exclaimed Feijóo, who has criticized the lack of a "minimum social sensitivity" of the Government, which it sees as having no "connection with reality".
Families would have saved, according to the leader of the PP, more than 800 million euros if the measures that he proposed at the time had been adopted, for which he has accused the Government of having collected 50,000 million more than last year without the majority of vulnerable groups benefit from aid or have "testimonial aid". In addition, the Executive "refuses to lower personal income tax for modest and medium incomes" as requested by the PP, when inflation is the highest in recent years and the increase in mortgages is "exponential."
On a propositional level, the president of the PP has proposed not cutting fuel aid, at least for the self-employed and the lowest incomes, and including fish, meat and preserves in basic products without VAT. In addition, Feijóo has criticized the Government for "not giving up countless ministries and hundreds of senior positions simply to live better" and has considered "difficult to explain" what he has baptized as the "electoral minicheque" of 200 euros for families with income of less than 27,000 euros per year while the Ministry of Culture finances leisure activities with 400 euros for young people who turn 18, something that it has branded as "immoral".
As an alternative, Feijóo has proposed that instead of giving that check, which requires a "bureaucracy" in which many citizens "get lost along the way", that amount be automatically returned through personal income tax, which he has also asked to reduce, for income less than 40,000 euros per year. "We want to help the Government with our proposals", indicated Feijóo, whose objective is "to improve the inflationary situation that the country is going through".
The "passivity" and "slowness" of the Government when it comes to helping the Spanish financially "contrasts", according to Feijóo, with the "enormous diligence in causing institutional degradation". In this sense, the head of the opposition has accused Sánchez of having "broken the trust" of the Spanish in the institutions by "violating" the principle of merit and replacing it with "adhesion to the leader", as has been seen, according to has indicated, in the CIS, Indra, the INE, the CNMV, the CNI, Correos, RTVE or the Constitutional Court.
This has happened, in Feijóo's opinion, because the Government has allied itself with "minorities whose objective is to fracture the institutions and the State itself" and because Sánchez has not done as president what he promised as a candidate by "turning Bildu and ERC into mainstays of his government and the parliamentary coalition", something that he has argued with the granting of pardons, the repeal of the crime of sedition or the embezzlement reform: "That was said by Sánchez himself who said that there would never ever be a referendum It has no credibility. The newspaper library and its records say so."
"I offered dialogue and they responded with contempt," Feijóo exclaimed at the hardest moment of his speech, in which he accused Sánchez of receiving his "agreement" proposals with "insults" and his "given word" with " tricks". For this reason, for the leader of the PP, "it is proven that Sánchez does not want to get along with the alternative party", which offers, instead, his "management experience", "sense of State" and "consensus for the great reforms".
Feijóo has announced that the PP will present an institutional quality plan in the near future to avoid cases of nepotism and attempts to control the institutions. "So that the best servers govern and not the most faithful followers", he explained. Its purpose is for the Spaniards to recover "respect for the institutions" and for politics, with the good intention of not lying in the campaign and disagreeing with the political adversary "without disqualifications", something for which Feijóo has offered his "personal commitment ".
Regarding the renewal of the Constitutional Court, Feijóo has insisted that the Government must "apologize expressly" for the "disqualifications and insults" to the members of the CGPJ, who, as he has stated, "has been described as coup plotters". . In addition, after the agreement to renew two magistrates of the High Court, Feijóo has demanded that the Government withdraw its "legal botchwork", which are "knowingly unconstitutional", aimed at modifying the appointment system.
Finally, he has assured that the CGPJ has fulfilled its duty with the two appointments that corresponded to it, which are "independent profiles" whose "exemplary nature" is "verified", and has demanded that the Government withdraw its candidates, "obscenely partisan ", in his opinion, for having been part of the Executive. "It is the opposite of the depoliticization of justice," said Feijóo, for whom "now it is more understood that the Government does not want to renew but rather control the CGPJ and the Constitutional Court."
