Pere Aragonès (Pineda de Mar, 1982) receives La Vanguardia at the beginning of the last year as president, excited to be a candidate again and satisfied because the path of dialogue that his party opened in Catalonia has consolidated
With a year to go before the elections, three challenges were highlighted in his inauguration speech. let's see The first was to face with total determination the emergencies and social inequalities we suffer. Has progress been made in this area?
Catalonia has made progress, but there is still much to do. If we just look, for example, at the unemployment rate indicator. Today we have an unemployment rate of 8.5%, the lowest in the last 15 years. We have a welfare State with many challenges, but with more instruments than ever and with more workers at the service of education, health, security or social services.
The second was to promote an economic reconstruction based on the industrial sector.
My Government has promoted the National Pact for Industry, which enjoyed unanimous support from a political point of view, with great agreement also with social agents and all the sectors involved.
And the third point he talked about was making amnesty and self-determination inevitable.
We got a good part of the way. I want to remember that when I was inaugurated as president we had nine people in prison. There was no established political dialogue framework and Catalonia was barely emerging from a pandemic that has left very deep scars. Today, almost three years later, we have the political prisoners released and an agreed amnesty that will be approved shortly.
Are you satisfied with your relationship with the Central Government?
The relationship I would like to have with the Spanish Government would be from State to State. I am an independentist. Therefore, I can never be satisfied with a relationship between an autonomous Catalonia and a Spain on which I depend. But I think that there has been a change that has not been easy, that has been based on betting on dialogue and negotiation. When we made this bet, there were sectors that despised it, in Catalonia and in Spain, but today we have a large majority in Parliament that is clearly betting on this path. And those who had criticized it, who had considered it useless, now go on to practice it.
The ones that he says have signed up now, that is, Junts, seem to have arrived later, but they have been ahead of them, because in the recent session of this week in Congress, he felt that they had negotiated better...
Beyond the sensations and the headlines, we need to see how these things materialize, because at the moment what we know is very generic and there are no details. The relevant agreements this week that have taken place are others. First of all, a royal decree law has been validated that provides tools to protect Catalans from poverty, as well as the guaranteed citizenship income, which will be jointly managed by the Generalitat.
In view of how this first session went, do you think that ERC should change its strategy, do something like Junts and tighten the rope more to try to achieve more?
I think that the State Government will have to reflect on which dynamics it favors and which it does not. We have a very clear strategic approach that is not based on tactics or last-minute races. We have a clear commitment to negotiation, to the resolution of the political conflict, to be able to culminate it with the exercise of a referendum. Along with this, we have set three objectives for this 2024: singular funding for Catalonia, that there also be the completion of the transfer of Rodalies and a clear commitment from Catalonia, but there must also be a commitment for part of the State, in the promotion and defense of the Catalan language.
The delegation of immigration powers has emerged from the fruits obtained by Junts. Does it look good to you? I ask because ERC voted against this transfer in a vote in Parliament.
I want to point out that what we voted against in Parliament was for a specific text, which had been proposed in this case together, and which we did not support because there were many elements in common with those who use immigration to disintegrate society. Therefore, we will not encounter populist discourses that use immigration for electoral purposes. I am pro-independence and, therefore, I want all the skills in immigration and in all areas. And another issue is security issues. I think that mixing it up does the country a disservice and moves away from the long tradition of Catalanism, which Junts or previously Convergència had also defended, that integrative Catalanism.
At the plenary session, the hurdles to start the amnesty law were also overcome. Will ERC submit amendments to the project?
If there are amendments that are presented, they will be made in agreement, especially with the State Government, because they are amendments of a technical nature to improve the text. The point is that it has to be as strong a law as possible, because we see that they have enemies. There are enemies of resolution in the connection of political conflict. There are enemies of the fact that this country goes from a situation of conflict to an institution of debate, dialogue, negotiation and being able to find agreements. And these enemies are very powerful in Spain and will try to boycott the application of the law in its spirit and in its form.
This climate of consensus that he offers to the central government is the same that he has to wait for the socialists to approve the budgets, isn't it?
I appeal not only to the PSC, but also to the commons, Junts and the CUP, the parties with which we have reached agreements throughout this legislature, to assume their responsibility for the budgets. We have done the work as a Government and we have prepared a project that foresees an increase in spending of 2.4 billion euros and that foresees providing the health of our country with an extraordinary fund of 800 million or that the field of education increased by more than 9%.
The Sánchez Government needs your votes to approve its own. It seems logical that they support each other.
Budgets will have to be negotiated, here and there.
Does it not guarantee support for central government budgets?
Esquerra has not signed any blank checks. Nor will we ask anyone to sign a blank check for our Government. Our wish is for there to be good budgets in Catalonia and good budgets in the State.
He said that his Government has indeed done the job, but there are many doubts from public opinion about the management. Let's go to more specific issues: drought. What has gone wrong so that the Barcelona region is about to enter this emergency situation?
What has happened is that we are experiencing the longest and most intense drought ever recorded. If it hadn't been for the fact that we activated the special drought plan two years ago, we would have been in an emergency a year ago. We have held up extraordinarily well and obviously we need to continue to expand infrastructure, especially as we will continue to have more droughts in the future.
But you will admit to me that there has been a deficit of investments in recent years, right?
I think we need to see the whole picture. And finally, look, the Catalan Water Agency, in this country, has been managed by the PSC, Convergència i Unió i Junts, Iniciativa i les comuns, and now it has been managed by the Left for two years .
Are you worried about whether the restrictions will affect the industry?
I am concerned about any affect. The primary sector, the farmers and ranchers of our country, are already making an important effort. And now it will be necessary for this effort to be undertaken by other sectors with a different intensity.
Do you reject the interconnection of the waters of the Ebro with the ATLL?
Yes, clearly. And I do it for two reasons. The first is because it doesn't make sense, and even less so: it goes against EU criteria. The internal basins of Catalonia, in the future and with the infrastructures we are building, must be able to fully develop without having to resort to the water of the Ebro. And the second is that, even if we rush to make the interconnection, it wouldn't do for the current drought.
Deficit of renewables. How do you plan to meet the goal of these energies reaching 50% of the electricity mix in 2030 when we are now only at 15%?
This is not done overnight. There is a question of regulation, planning, incentives and procedures that must be complied with. When we started this legislature, there were nine megawatts authorized in the processing phase to build renewable energy plants. We are now exceeding 1,600 megawatts.
Education after the PISA report. How can you explain the paradox that there has never been as much budget invested in education as now and instead there have been such low educational performance results?
The answer is very simple: results in education do not happen overnight. A student is part of our country's education system from the age of 3 to at least 16. So we are talking about 13 years. These are years in which physical investment is made to train a person and then we continue with professional or university training. Therefore, it is a policy that the results are seen in the medium and long term. The PISA results probably explain a situation that is the result of decisions made several years ago.
Why does the Government have so many doubts when making the decision to ban mobile phones in schools?
This will happen very soon. And the decisions will go through a restriction on the use of mobile phones in primary schools, and a very restrictive action and regulation in institutes. In other words, if there is any teaching activity that requires the use of the mobile phone, go ahead, but for the rest it must not be present in the classrooms or in the playgrounds, to promote spaces for interaction between them.
Given the chaotic situation in primary care, what do we say to Catalans: get used to queues or sign up for private healthcare?
We have made a clear commitment to the public health of this country. And this happens in the first place because of a bet on the professionals. The agreement we have made in the field of the ICS is a good agreement that will favor the retention of talent, that doctors trained in Catalonia have more opportunities here and do not have to leave. Also with nurses, who can fully develop their specialties. These days we are experiencing a flu epidemic situation and, therefore, there will be more people who need immediate attention and tension can be generated in some centers.
For years we have been dragging out the expansion of the airport and the problems of Rodalies. The solution seems to be the creation of commissions... This takes forever.
The transfer of Rodalies will be a reality very soon. What was required here was political will and it must be accompanied by resources, but this is a detailed agreement. It will begin to be seen in the general budgets of the State, as agreed.
And the airport?
Regarding the future of El Prat airport, I want to remind you that the goal is not an expansion for the sake of expansion. The aim is to have more intercontinental connections, especially with the Pacific. And for this we will have to look for solutions that are not simple, if we want to meet environmental standards. And in addition, I believe that the best way to ensure a future for El Prat airport is for it to be managed from here.
He has a year left as president, how would he like to be remembered?
We are the ones who paved the way when no one believed that negotiation was useful to resolve the political conflict and when everyone said that amnesty was impossible and that we would not even consider a transfer of Rodalies, that we would not have it. Today, everyone focuses on the negotiation strategy, each in their own way, but in the end we are all in the same negotiation dynamic, and that is good.
When will he call elections? Will the legislature run out?
I have always said that the elections will be in February 2025. We are a Government that has been approving budgets year after year, despite the situation of not having a stable parliamentary majority. For many years, budgets were not approved in Catalonia year after year, continuously, and we do not have a full legislature in Catalonia.
And do you want to be the ERC candidate for the elections?
The ERC candidates are decided by the party and, therefore, among all with the established procedures. I will not skip these procedures. Obviously, when you are governing the country, you see that the projects do not culminate in a legislature. Therefore, I have all the energy, all the strength to continue.
