Trias: "It's a bad financing deal, but perhaps it's the only option."

BarcelonaThe Junts leadership hasn't budged an inch from its resounding "no" to the proposed new financing model since it was presented last Friday. Without a special economic agreement, Junts members have repeatedly stated, they cannot be counted on. But can Catalonia afford to forgo another 4.7 billion euros? The president of the Junts mayors' council, Xavier Trias, believes it's "almost impossible," even though that amount is insufficient to resolve the structural fiscal deficit the country has suffered for decades. In statements to Coffee of Ideas Trias, speaking on behalf of 2Cat, warned that the State has always ended up "entangled" the Generalitat - he explained that he had been a victim in other financing negotiations - and that the pact between ERC and PSOE is "a bad agreement", but acknowledged that "perhaps it is the only possible thing".

"I don't know how it will end; it's difficult to give up 4 billion. Almost impossible," insisted the party's last mayoral candidate for Barcelona. Trias also asked ERC to stop presenting the new model as a grand agreement and to openly acknowledge that "it hasn't gone well." "We must tell the truth; we are being blackmailed," he added, referring to the two options Junts now has on the table: either accept the 4.7 billion for the Generalitat or nothing. "The problem is that Catalonia has a fiscal balance deficit with a hole of 23 billion euros. In four days, it will have the problem again," he concluded.

Another former Junts councilor, Jaume Giró, has also come out in favor of negotiating the new financing model so that it can be approved in Congress. However, Trias and Giró are among the few public voices within the Junta to have taken this stance, and they will present a comprehensive amendment to ensure that the financing proposal presented by the Minister of Finance never becomes a reality.