Salvador Illa stumbles over the same stone as Pere Aragonès

BarcelonaA failed budget marked the end of Pere Aragonès's government exactly two years ago. Now, Salvador Illa faces a resounding defeat in the Catalan Parliament, and speculation has begun about whether the conflict will also end at the ballot box. except CommonsThe other parliamentary groups, including ERC, have submitted amendments to the entire budget. The Catalan government (Palau de la Generalitat) is avoiding this scenario and reiterates that having a budget is "plan A, B, and C." Negotiations remain stalled, and now the Republicans are even talking about June as a possible timeframe for unblocking them—provided the central government and the Moncloa Palace commit to transferring the personal income tax revenue. This Saturday, the President of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, again pressured ERC to agree to approve the budget given the context of the war in the Middle East and its potential economic consequences. In an address to the Catalan Social Dialogue Council—which includes representatives from unions and employers' associations—Illa asked the Republicans to "rise to the occasion of this extraordinary moment the world is experiencing." "They are the best social safety net," he declared.

Only Aragonès and Carles Puigdemont – with Oriol Junqueras as Minister of Economy – have brought budgets to a vote without guaranteed support. In both cases, the proposals were rejected by the Catalan Parliament. In 2017, the failure led to a vote of confidence, in which Puigdemont received the support of the CUP, and to the subsequent referendum of October 1st.

Aragonès, on the other hand, decided to end his term after the Comuns' "no" vote, with the threat of the drought then plaguing the country as a backdrop. Jéssica Albiach's party conditioned its support on halting the Hard Rock mega-casino project, a demand that was directly incompatible with what ERC had agreed with the PSC: to move forward with it.

Now nobody remembers the Hard Rock Hotel or the B-40 highway, and it's the Republicans who are keeping the pressure on the PSC, demanding that they commit the PSOE to guaranteeing that they will promote the necessary legislative changes so that the Catalan Tax Agency (ATC) can collect all taxes, starting with personal income tax. This demand stems from the PSC's investiture agreement with ERC, and that marks a key difference from the negotiations that took place in 2024 with the same parties. In both that budget proposal and the previous one, Pere Aragonès's government sought out two political forces, the PSC and Comuns, that had not participated in his investiture, which came about thanks to Junts and the CUP.

The budgets of the macro-projectsAragonès accepted the outstretched hand of Salvador Illa's party after being forced to govern alone due to the walkout of the Junts per Catalunya coalition. In 2023, the then-president capitulated to three demands with which he did not ideologically agree: promoting the Hard Rock Hotel, studying the expansion of Barcelona Airport, and completing the B-40 highway between Sabadell, Terrassa, and Castellar del Vallès. A year later, the Socialists made review of what had been accomplished and what had not And, seeing that there was no progress with the mega-casino, they forced Aragonès to commit to approving their master plan in order to guarantee their votes in the 2024 budget.

The Republicans still remember the unease generated by having to swallow these bitter pills to get their votes.From the Socialists' perspective: it was Illa who personally outlined the priorities for that negotiation, along with the current Minister of Economy, Alícia Romero. The decision to capitulate not only strained the Catalan Government—shortly afterward, the Minister of Territory, Juli Fernàndez, resigned—but also the regional federations, especially in Vallès.

Are the Republicans now paying Illa back in kind? "It's one thing to condition a negotiation on being able to manage the personal income tax, and quite another to condition a budget on a casino, a highway, or an airport that are not under the jurisdiction of the Generalitat. You wanted to inflict political costs on us in exchange for your vote, and you know it," the ERC leader in the Catalan Parliament, Josep Maria Jové, snapped at the Minister of the Presidency, Albert Dalmau. In theory, Illa's government also supports the transfer of personal income tax (IRPF) and in Madrid has tried, so far unsuccessfully, to persuade the PSOE, which is resisting the delegation of more tax management powers to the autonomous communities.

The role of ComunsERC and PSC have switched roles, and so has Comuns, the party responsible for rejecting Aragonès's budget, which is now joining forces with the Catalan government and calling for "responsibility" from the Republicans. This call has outraged several ERC members who, on social media, haven't held back. "What nerve," said ERC's deputy general secretary, Joan Plana, this week.

Even after the 2024 elections, in which they lost two seats—one in Tarragona—Jéssica Albiach's group engaged in self-criticism regarding their position during that year's budget negotiations, for which they received a reprimand from the unions. Furthermore, a few months later came the Hard Rock Hotel agreement, when the PSC decided to soften its stance to guarantee Illa's investiture. A three-way agreement between Esquerra Republicana (ERC), the PSC, and Comuns resulted in a change to the law, eliminating Hard Rock's tax privilege: casinos would once again be taxed at 55%, and the planned tax break for when the Vila-seca and Salou resort opened would be eliminated. The agreement passed with the support of the CUP and, according to ERC and Comuns, should render the project economically unviable and halt its development. de facto.