Junts per Catalunya does not want to modify the Language Policy Law. Advocates for a decree law that gives the Department of Education the responsibility of initialing the linguistic projects of each center as a measure to preserve immersion in the face of the ruling of the Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC), which requires giving 25% of classes in Spanish in Catalan classrooms. JxCat sent the proposal yesterday to its partner in the Government, Esquerra, who believes that it falls short, that a law in Parliament will always have "more status as a law" than a decree law and that it does not solve the underlying problem. On the contrary, it proposes a tweak in the reform of the Language Policy Law that makes it explicit that there is no place for percentages of languages in the Catalan school. An amendment that the Republicans work with the PSC and the commons to reincorporate Junts into the March pact.
"Disobedience does not guarantee the protection of Catalan in court," argue the Republicans. Their preferred bet is to pass a law in Parliament –the reform of the Language Policy Law would be the best shortcut, they say–, and not so much by a decree law as the spokesman for Junts, Josep Rius, claimed yesterday.
In any case, the JxCat decree would affect the Catalan Education Law of 2009. But ERC fears that the opening of this melon could cause the courts to act and laminate other aspects of the LEC.
Meanwhile, the clock ticks. The TSJC set a deadline of 15 business days for the application of the sentence that expires on May 31, and the political formations still do not agree on how to proceed. In this disagreement are the PSC, ERC and the commons on one side, and Junts on the other.
JxCat maintains that its initiative protects teachers and the management of educational centers. Therefore, the responsibility would fall on the Minister of the branch, now Josep Gonzàlez-Cambray. "It is not about disobeying [the TSJC], it is about applying the current legal framework," said Rius, who pointed out that the law should not be "adapted" to the sentence.
The formula preferred by Junts is the decree law, since, as they reason, it would leave the TSJC outside the judicial process and only the Constitutional Court could rule if it is challenged. However, the also vice president of Junts pointed out that if a decree is preferred, there would be no problem.
Meanwhile, the ERC, the PSC and the commons advocate for the reform of the Language Policy law that they agreed to at the end of March, also with Junts, which withdrew from the agreement just a few hours after signing it and registering it in Parliament. The formation fell off completely last week. "There is no independent legal study that says that the reform of the Language Policy Law will serve to protect immersion," Rius said yesterday.
The PSC, for its part, does not close the door to incorporating changes to the initial agreement as long as they are not substantial.
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