Pedro Sánchez and Yolanda Díaz have agreed to “accelerate” the negotiations to have a coalition government agreement throughout this month of October, according to the Secretary of State for Social Rights and negotiator on behalf of Sumar, Nacho Álvarez.
Álvarez has appeared in Congress after the acting president of the Government and the leader of Sumar and second vice president have held a meeting of a little more than an hour in the Lower House, once Sánchez accepted the king’s commission this Tuesday to try to form a Government after last week’s failure of the investiture of the popular candidate, Alberto Núñez Feijóo .
He has assured that although in these two months that they have been talking there has been progress, an understanding is still pending on key issues for Sumar that have to do with progress in social and labor matters.
Doubts cleared and unknowns that persist after the king’s order to Sánchez
For example, he has cited the reduction of the working day, the promotion of a new “21st century” labor statute that regulates dismissal and links it to an objective legal cause, the improvement of conciliation or strengthening the right to access to the house.
He has recognized that in these matters there are “important differences”, but despite this he assumes that there will be an agreement, although he has insisted that “not just any government will do” and that he should not be satisfied “with what was already done in the previous legislature.”
In relation to this, he has ruled out that Podemos’s differences with the Sumar leadership, among other things because they demand that Irene Montero remain in the Council of Ministers, could derail an agreement with the PSOE: “the entire coalition is at the service of there being a coalition agreement.”
Nacho Álvarez has warned that they are not in favor of ensuring that the agreement reached is minimal and makes the Government work “at idle” and that is why they are going to insist that the program be “ambitious.”
They do not want to talk about “red lines or black lines” because what it is about – he stressed – is that the program “is useful to continue advancing in social, labor and civil rights for citizens.”
At this moment, they are putting “all the effort and focus” on social matters and not so much “on the lane of territorial advances” although they have made it clear “that both lanes have to be present for there to be an agreement.”
The composition of that eventual Executive has not yet been addressed nor what names could be there, but Sumar sources have indicated that this issue will be addressed later and in parallel to the negotiation of the government agreement but when it is already on track.
Regarding the amnesty for the protagonists of 1-O, a condition that ERC and Junts demand to support Sánchez’s investiture, Álvarez explained that they have no disagreements with the PSOE on this matter, which Sumar is also negotiating separately with the Catalan independentists.
Sánchez held the first meeting of his round of consultations with the parties this Wednesday with Yolanda Díaz, and will continue next week with the rest of the forces, except Vox, with whom he will not speak.
Puente, Bolaños and Montero, in the PSOE commission
The PSOE has appointed a commission of seven people to negotiate the investiture of Pedro Sánchez with the groups, among which are prominent members of the party such as María Jesús Montero, Félix Bolaños, Santos Cerdán and Pilar Alegría, and the deputies Óscar Puente and José Ramón Gomez Besteiro.
Specifically, this group is made up of socialists with relevant positions, such as the general secretary of the PSOE and acting Minister of Finance, María Jesús Montero; the acting Minister of the Presidency, Félix Bolaños; the spokesperson for the Federal Executive of the PSOE and acting Minister of Education and Vocational Training, Pilar Alegría; and the Secretary of Organization of the PSOE, Santos Cerdán, as reported by the party in a press release.
The negotiating commission is completed by the Secretary of International Policy and Cooperation of the PSOE, Hana Jalloul; and the socialist deputies Óscar Puente and José Ramón Gómez Besteiro, who have had prominent roles in the plenary sessions of Congress that have taken place in the legislature that has just begun.
Belarra: negotiations with the PSOE are not progressing “as they should”
The general secretary of Podemos and acting minister of Social Rights and Agenda 2030, Ione Belarra, stated this Wednesday that the negotiations with the PSOE “at the moment are not progressing as they should”, as reflected, in her opinion, that the socialists are still have not given them a “formal response” to the five proposals that have been sent to them to give them their support.
This is what the minister said during a visit to the Colmenar Viejo Parish Cemetery (Madrid) to learn about the exhumation work being carried out in its common graves, where she insisted that the next legislature “cannot be a dead end, “Do nothing and leave things as they are.”
“It has to be a legislature of transformations, because if not we will roll out the red carpet for the right,” Belarra mentioned.
Sánchez meets today with Illa in full negotiations
The general secretary of the PSOE and acting president of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, meets this afternoon at the party headquarters in Madrid with the leader of the PSC, Salvador Illa, with whom he is in “permanent coordination” to negotiate issues related to Catalonia within the framework of his investiture.
The PSOE has reported in a press release that this meeting between Sánchez and Illa will be this Wednesday afternoon, without specifying the time or further details in this regard.
By Web Desk
