The pacts with Catalonia that are in danger if Sánchez calls elections

BarcelonaGabriel Rufián asked this Friday for "a cool head" from Pedro Sánchez when deciding whether to press the red button to call early elections. The republican spokesperson said this because on the left of the PSOE there is "nothing to add up" – the Sumar space has not yet chosen a visible face nor has it negotiated what its coalition will look like. This has been one of Rufián's obsessions for months: to bring together left-wing and pro-sovereignty forces from across the State into a broad front to try to maximize the vote – a proposal that has met with the frontal rejection of Oriol Junqueras. But beyond how this space is reconfigured, Rufián overlooked that if the Spanish legislature ends, the main pacts that ERC still has to fulfill will also become null and void. Without going any further, the new financing model for Catalonia, the star pact that led ERC to invest Salvador Illa, would not see the light of day.

The proposal that the former Minister of Finance, María Jesús Montero, presented last January –after months of stalled negotiations– would be paralyzed, although in this case, it was difficult for it to prosper with Sánchez in government because Junts did not endorse it. Although the PSOE assumed the agreement, the socialists have dragged their feet from the beginning to materialize this pact. And the proof is that a year and a half had to pass since they signed it for the two parties to reach a pact that lowered the content signed in July 2024.

But beyond the financing, if after a few days of reflection, Sánchez decides to put an end to a legislature that he has pushed in recent months despite all the judicial fronts that have been emerging, he would drop measures agreed with the partners that he has not yet materialized until now. This is the case of the forgiveness of part of the debt of the Autonomous Liquidity Fund (FLA), agreed with ERC to invest the socialist leader in 2023, which has been dragging on throughout the legislature. Socialists and republicans had agreed to bring it to a vote this autumn in Congress with the complicity of Junts, which was willing to support it. In this law, Esquerra also wanted to incorporate the change in governance of the Zona Franca Consortium that the party agreed with the PSC for the 2026 budget so that the Generalitat would come to have the majority. This transfer would also be halted.

The transfer of Rodalies

ERC would also see the transfer of Rodalies come to a halt. The change in ownership of the service had begun to materialize with the creation of the joint company that was to manage Rodalies and with the first steps for the Generalitat to assume management of the network's first line, the R1. But not only would ERC see its main agreements with the socialists put away in a drawer, but Junts would also not see the Spanish government transfer immigration powers to Catalonia. A pact that Junts closed with the PSOE in January 2024 without it having become a reality. Just as the official status of Catalan in the European Union, which Junts also agreed upon with the socialists, has not materialized.

The Junts members considered their relationship with the socialists broken months ago, when they denounced the "non-compliance" of the signed agreements. The amnesty law still remains to be fully applied, but in this case, it is in the hands of the courts. Next week will be key to starting the countdown for the return of Carles Puigdemont. This has, in fact, been the eternal pending issue of Pedro Sánchez's legislature, who must now decide whether to put an end to a term that would result in the non-compliance of most key agreements with the Catalan independence supporters.

The details of the week