Mayor Jaume Collboni's government suffered its first political setback yesterday afternoon. Faced with the blockade announced in unison by the entire opposition, the municipal executive had no choice but to withdraw from the agenda of the Economy and Finance committee the initial approval of the City Council's budgets Barcelona for 2024. Shortly before, those of Junts, BComú, ERC, PP and Vox rejected the fiscal ordinances proposed by the PSC. This was not fully announced, the tax issue was still in suspense. However, this alley has some exits. The citizen must not necessarily be harmed.
Since his proclamation as mayor, despite the fact that he only has ten councilors out of a total of 41, Collboni had surfed with a certain placidity. But most of the opposition councilors are not willing to make things easier for him in exchange for anything. The summer is already over. Junts and BComú, in particular, are stubborn in assuming government responsibilities, in which the City Council's action reflects its electoral programs.
And so far Collboni has been much more in favor of variable geometry, of specific agreements, with one or the other depending on the issue. These extremes explain to a good extent what happened yesterday in the Economy committee. Accounts are not just a matter of numbers. Government and opposition accuse each other, and repeatedly, of having everything well decided in advance, of not wanting to negotiate anything.
The withdrawal of the budgets from the agenda happened in extremis, at the last moment, with the commission already started, after the opposition forces also rejected the fiscal ordinances proposed by the government en bloc. The deputy mayor for Economy, the socialist Jordi Valls, defended a tax policy based mainly on not increasing the fiscal pressure on the citizen and doubling it on cruise ships and tourist apartments.
All the opposition spokesmen found an argument to reject these ordinances. And Valls did not hesitate to reprimand them all that in truth his will is not to dialogue, but to govern, and that he is doing nothing more than letting himself be carried away by clearly partisan interests. The debate, more than rough, seemed stiff. Then the socialist executive withdrew the budget vote from the agenda at the last minute. The issue was already muddled.
But this alley has exits. The Collboni government can still avoid the extension of this year's budgets without having to submit to an annoying question of confidence. Since he withdrew his proposal for accounts, he can present a different one in a new file, in another Economy committee. The government no longer has time to do it in the regular November session, but it does in another session that it convenes in an extraordinary way, in the same month, in December or even starting in 2024. Deadlines are not the main stumbling block of the new budgets In the corridors of Sant Jaume's offices, Deputy Mayor Valls stated that he is certain that sooner or later the city will have new budgets. But he didn't say it with much enthusiasm.
A different case is that of fiscal ordinances. They will be voted on again at the next municipal meeting, Friday next week. If in the meantime the negotiations between the groups bear fruit, they can be approved initially with the tacit agreement that others, the ones finally agreed, will be submitted to the final vote. But if in the next plenary session the opposition vetoes them again, the 2023 ones will be maintained next year.
And in this case, that of taxation, the citizen will indeed notice some of the consequences. For example, the last agreement between the City Council and the Restoration Guild on the terrace fee would be null and void. The changes proposed in the tax ordinances mean an overall increase in revenue compared to the current one, which is very small, of around six million euros, according to the executive's calculations. On the other hand, the total revenue via fees and taxes foreseen in the budgets that wanted to be submitted to a vote was 71 million more than that of the 2023 accounts. This is because they take into account estimated variations in population, economic activity, number of vehicles or cadastral value of properties, among other aspects.
