Budgets: missing the opportunity

Politics often has reasons that reason cannot comprehend. It seems that the PSC and ERC are in agreement to try to reach a budget that the country needs after so much frustration. There shouldn't be fundamental disagreements on the content, but Junqueras is setting a condition that depends on the Spanish government: the transfer of personal income tax management to the Catalan government. An old and reasonable aspiration that, in addition to its economic value, also has symbolic value, which the PSC seems to share, and which is generating irritation in the Spanish autonomous communities.

So far, everything is clear: everyone is playing their cards. And certainly, having the central government as an actor, even a secondary one, in the Catalan budget negotiations has its risks. The issue has been evaded amidst ambiguities that made the outcome predictable. The central government, using the Andalusian elections as a pretext, has said NoAnd Esquerra has established its profile: Yeah or nothing. The government postpones the budget, with the understanding that no door is closed: a few extra months are given to negotiate, taking for granted the No from the Spanish government. Esquerra suggests that the demand for the transfer of the Personal Income Tax (IRPF) as a condition for approval is not absolute in a negotiation that opens new perspectives.

The case is complex. And in any negotiation, both sides logically seek to gain something. Now Esquerra will set other objectives, while trying to continue fighting for the transfer of the IRPF, which the PSC seems to support but lacks the clout to impose in Madrid. Therefore, some unpredictable months are opening up in which the opposition will obviously try to gain an advantage. Sort has the current government, Junts is in a state of confusion due to a loss of position and strategic sense, and the far right, from the PP to Vox and including Aliança Catalana, is uniting the adversaries against it. But in this scenario, was this delay necessary now? Wouldn't it have been more rational to finalize a budget that would allow progress while simultaneously continuing to work towards the transfer of the Personal Income Tax (IRPF), truly creating a shared objective that would be a victory for Esquerra and, at the same time, empower the president? With the solution adopted, everyone emerges somewhat weakened. Isla couldn't secure Madrid's support, and at the same time, Junqueras is left halfway there. He doesn't give up, but he doesn't win either.

For Esquerra, postponement is a necessary ritual to make themselves heard. Having the budget approved is a factor of cohesion and efficiency that governing responsibility demands. And sharing the demand for the IRPF could be part of the agreement. It's hard to understand how, in the struggle for the differentiating factor, to mark one's own territory, situations like this arise, where the agreement to seek a governing majority gets stuck in a yes-but-no. The predictable rigidity of the PSOE, which constrains the PSC and acts as a scapegoat for Esquerra, is paralyzing the construction of a stable majority that seems quite reasonable in the current situation and would empower the entire left. Is it worth losing this opportunity at a time when the reactionary current is accelerating, with the extreme right riding on the coattails of the right, as if post-democratic authoritarianism were already a predetermined fate?