Vox is now aiming to speak more in Catalan... but is maintaining its crusade against the language

BarcelonaVox now speaks more Catalan than before. This legislative period, the Spanish far-right has considerably increased the use of its own language in the Parliament, with more MPs speaking it and in more interventions, and even the party's secretary general, Ignacio Garriga, is responding in Catalan to interviews with the Catalan media, such as TV3 or other recent statements to ACN. The change in the use of the language has been noted in plenary sessions and committees, as well as in some promotional videos of the party. The MPs Joan Garriga, Manuel Acosta, Julia Calvet, Mònica Lora, Alberto Tarradas and Rafael Villafranca are often using the language, while in the last legislative period it was mainly Garriga, Lora and sometimes Acosta who did so –alternating it with Castilian–. What is the reason for this change? What are the underlying reasons?

The change in strategy of the extreme right occurs in a context in which they managed to consolidate the 11 deputies in the Parliament in the last elections, but they did not grow in votes in inland Catalonia or in demarcations such as Girona or Lleida, with support below the Catalan average. At the same time, they have seen the emergence of a competitor in the ultra space, Aliança Catalana, with an independence stance and which Yes, it has made a dent in these territories. Consulted by ARA, Vox sources see it as a question of speaking "naturally" in Catalan as well - while pointing out that there are more Catalan-speaking deputies - but also because of the desire to "grow in places" where they have not been present until now. Asked if they do it to dispute votes with Aliança Catalana, their interpretation is that rather than competing with this party - with whom they share an ideology except for the national axis - they want to make holes in territories where they have traditionally had a hard time. However, in the municipal elections internally they do see that there may be an anti-immigration vote in dispute with Silvia Orriols's party. "There has been a change in usage, but not politically; we are tough on language policy and against discrimination in Spanish," warn the sources.

And this is confirmed, in fact, in their latest political messages, in which they continue their crusade against the policies of normalisation of Catalan: without going any further, in the last control session Garriga reproached the president of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, for the "imposition of Catalan", criticising a budget of 9 million for the language, and this Friday, 8,000 million euros. They continue to demand the removal of "linguistic borders" in Spain and defend labelling everywhere at least in the language of the State and free choice in schools.

The most relevant turn

The most significant change is that of Tarradas, the party leader in Girona, who has incorporated Catalan all at once, even in entire speeches. "Alberto has been encouraged," say sources from Vox, who admit that the consideration that "Catalan is very present in Girona" and that the idea that it would be good for him to also speak Catalan had recently gained strength in the change. In other words, they are aware that in many places in the interior, as well as in Girona and Lleida, it is not common to hear Spanish. In private, they even admit that the residual use of Catalan in the parliamentary group of the last legislature does contrast quite a bit with the linguistic reality of society. One of the points that Vox takes into account is that in the interior municipalities and those far from the metropolitan area, they do not want to be perceived as foreign to the territory.

They maintain official communication in Spanish

In recent months they have also had to deal with another debate: the Catalan Alliance is making linguistic amendments to their motions by translating them into Catalan. Sources consulted report that they could have opted to present motions and propositions directly in Catalan, but that in the last legislature they tried to present a bilingual one and the Parliament informed them that they could not present a text repeated twice. Therefore, in order to be consistent with the ideology that "public communications must be at least in Spanish", they do not register proposals in Catalan and limit themselves to accepting amendments.