Francina Armengol (PSOE) aspires to repeat her mandate in the Balearic Islands after Sunday's elections. Never before has the left governed two legislatures in a row and now she hopes to repeat the third with her partners, PSOE and Més.
She is convinced of her victory. Do you have surveys?
There are different polls that make it possible for us to win the elections.
Win the elections or be able to govern? They are different things.
It is better to win and rule and that is my goal. I present myself so that the PSOE is the majority force and I also ask for a massive vote for my party. If we do not have the strength to govern alone, the important thing is to join others. We have shown that we know how to govern together and that we know how to agree for the benefit of the people, putting aside the issues that separate us.
You are comfortable in the photos with Pedro Sánchez, something that does not happen with other socialist barons.
I have had to govern with Rajoy and with Sánchez and there is a huge difference. We share ideas and objectives and that has helped us a lot to achieve things for the Balearic Islands that had never been achieved before: money for the tram, to understand the discontinuous landlines, the 855 million that companies received in the pandemic... When we call, there are people who gets on the phone and listens to us.
Doesn't it bother you that some comrades and barons of the PSOE speak almost through the mouth of the PP, as in the case of the Bildu lists?
I am a person loyal to the PSOE and I don't always agree with decision-making, but when I don't agree with something, I have always said it internally. It is not good to make statements that can benefit my territory, but that harm other territories. If you do not agree, the fair thing is to raise it within the PSOE. Unnecessary media conflicts do not help.
In this legislature there has been closeness with the Valencian Community, but less with Catalonia. Because?
I have had contact with three presidents of the Generalitat and with the least with Quim Torra, but it must be taken into account that Catalonia decided for a long time to be involved in other things and that has been a misfortune, from my point of view. We share history, culture and language, things from the past, but also economic interests for the future. I have had quite a relationship with President Aragonès, although his electoral times have not been the same as ours.
Do you think relations should be intensified?
We have a very fluid relationship with President Aragonès and we have worked on some issues together. It is true that with President Ximo Puig, of whom I am a friend, we have been governing for eight years with very similar governments and with similar political objectives that we have been able to channel. Catalonia has some complexities that have made the relationship somewhat difficult, but I have pressured all the Catalan presidents to be in the multilateral debate. I understand the bilateral debate and I exercise it, but when there is a debate between 17, if Catalonia is there, if the periphery is there and we all go together, the balance is towards who decides, whether from centralism or from the periphery, which is the debate in Spain , changes because Catalonia has a relevant weight.
One week before the elections, his campaign has focused on claiming the economic resurgence of the Balearic Islands after the collapse of the pandemic.
On May 28, an essential matter is decided: to advance or to retreat. We have a pact for the future and an approach to more years and I think that people will value the ability to manage and have been by the side of people when there are problems. At a time of pandemic, we knew how to withstand a very hard blow in the economy, but also in health, and we came out well. I think that the citizens value that there are people in the institutions who know how to govern, from dialogue, but also from stability.
But do you think that citizens notice this recovery?
Of course. Many young people stop me to tell me that it's a good thing their job is permanent for the first time, and that's thanks to the labor reform.
He talks about young people and housing is a serious problem in the Islands. The Balearic Islands have approved measures that, for now, have not worked.
The housing problem cannot be fixed in four or eight years because it is a much deeper issue that affects territories that are thriving in economy and that, in the case of the Balearic Islands, also has the addition that it is an environment wonderful that attracts a lot of people. We also have enormous pressure on the ground and a legacy of years of real estate speculation on our land. The subsidized houses were only protected for 30 years and then they began to speculate with them and we have prohibited that.
But what else can be done?
There is still a long way to go, but now we are in the right direction. For the first time there is a Government that has made more subsidized housing than in the entire democratic history of these islands. We have innovated in policies included in the State Housing Law and that will now give us tools for the next legislature. We need an agreement for housing with the administrations and with the private sector to develop the law.
You will apply the Law. Ayuso has said that he will not.
In a state of law, the laws apply. If what Ayuso says was said by someone from a nationalist party, I don't know what the PP would say. We were asking for it and it has finally arrived. It is the first democratic housing law because until now there were only land laws and finally housing is defined as a right and not as a speculative asset. We will seek tax incentives for the small owner who rents at affordable prices.
His party, the PSOE, was reluctant to accept this law that Podemos was asking for.
All's well That ends well. I am not going to fight for ownership of the law, but it is obvious that the minister is a socialist. There has been a negotiation with the partners and with other parties with a presence in Congress.
Do fewer tourists have to come to the Balearic Islands?
The Balearic Islands have to adapt to climate change and we have to think about how we grow, both in fixed and floating population, because we have scarce resources. In order to continue living in a community linked to tourism, we must adapt to the new realities of the 21st century: we must achieve that balance between residents and tourists and that tourists have a good experience, and for this we must avoid saturation.
The PP accuses them of not acting against saturation to have excuses to decrease.
That is surreal and Kafkaesque. You have to be serious and know that we cannot reduce the number of people who arrive by air or sea transport, but we can reduce the number of places where they can stay, and that is what we have done, and also in agreement with the employers. Who is totally out of touch with reality is the PP, which continues with the recipes of many years ago. The pact with hoteliers has worked in the Balearic Islands and we have approved a moratorium that defines that quantity is not important, but quality. Hoteliers have been eliminating places for a few years.
The bet is to reduce places, then.
Yes, and we are also working on it. We are charging one and two star hotels to eliminate them from the market and make official protection housing or sponging. It is the logical line towards which tourism in the Balearic Islands must go, that of reducing places.
You have coined the term 'the Spain that fills' as opposed to the one that empties. What can be done to meet the challenge of overpopulation?
That's one of the problems with being a very attractive community, economically and as a place to live. Given this, financing must be guaranteed for those who live here. We are working with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs so that the EU approves a statute for populated islands, because the Mediterranean islands are limited and fragile territories and we are going to suffer much more from climate change.
They also have tourism in common.
Yes, tourism is also an intensive activity that requires labor and who comes to live on the Islands. It is necessary to have extraordinary financing to have the adequate infrastructures and it is necessary to act urbanistically as it should. It is necessary to guarantee that the people who live here can do it and that is what we are doing: we must grow in height, not horizontally, because there are city councils that have opted for semi-detached houses and luxury villas that are bought by foreigners and do not solve the problem of the ones from here
Should non-residents be prevented from buying housing?
This is a task that the Balearic Parliament has marked us. We are studying it, but they are very long-term measures. We have transferred it to the Government of Spain, which in turn has to transfer it to the European Union.
He was talking about financing. It has not been possible to reform the current system.
-The current system has placed us in the financing average and with Aznar's we were 21 points below. In this legislature we have managed to get the Special and Fiscal Regime for the Balearic Islands approved, because that was a bilateral negotiation, easier than a negotiation with 17. Now we have to go for the other thing and we have to put on the table that it is financed by the system is health, education and social services and that is where people live. It cannot be an excuse for the less populated territories.
