This morning there is again a meeting between the Department of Education and the teaching unions at the headquarters of the ministry. The unions will not have to walk far to get there, because they have spent the night locked in the ministry.

Sánchez is this morning at the lowest point of his presidency. Lower means that every day is worse than the last. It reminds me a lot of 1996, during the last months of Felipe González and Aznar's first victory, when cases and revelations rained down every day. Yesterday, the Civil Guard entered the PSOE headquarters and was taking information for 12 hours. We don't know what they seized, but we know what the judge's report says, and it broadens the focus: the PSOE allegedly maneuvered to obstruct justice. Or as the judicial report says, it allegedly orchestrated a “trama to destabilize judicial proceedings against the PSOE or the Spanish government.” The judge is investigating whether the PSOE paid people to pay police officers or prosecutors to hinder investigations against the PSOE, against Sánchez or his circle. Who would be part of this group and what were they doing? On this page you have it: Who's who in the alleged plot to “obstruct” judicial cases. From the details that have emerged, the PSOE allegedly paid former militant Leire Díez about 4,000 a month, with false invoices. That is, the PSOE allegedly put its party structure at the service of illegal activities. This would be very serious, and even more so if we consider that it is unlikely the party would do anything without Sánchez.

The Central Operational Unit of the Civil Guard entered the PSOE headquarters this morning to request information. They are looking for an alleged illegal financing network of the party. Let's see, a police entry reinforces the feeling of guilt of the investigated person, which, in the era of narrative over facts, is ideal for those who wish harm to the suspect. But if anywhere we know what effect the interested administration of the judicial instruction and police investigation has with a specific intention, it is in Catalonia.

Amidst the world's misfortunes and Spanish politics, this image of presidential happiness appears.Salvador Illa, happy as a clam, taking a selfie with Bad Bunny inside the main nave of the Sagrada Família. Illa looks like he's about to sing: “If you want to have fun with charm and finesse, you just have to live a summer in Catalonia with warmth”.Bad Bunny is the best thing that will happen to Illa in the coming days, because the hurricane of the Zapatero case threatens the stability of Sánchez's government and, by extension, that of the Generalitat government, which is so closely linked to it.In the last few hours we have learned that the Economic and Fiscal Crime Unit of the National Police, the UDEF, has found in Zapatero's office: jewelry, folders and mobile phones. In short, there are three lines here: Zapatero is a victim of lawfare because let him do to Sánchez what he can do, Zapatero has crossed the fine line between lobbyist and influence peddler, and Zapatero is corrupt. Probably, what we have here is that the evidence gathered by the judge (the photos of the jewelry are police propaganda) could indicate that Zapatero has gone further, recklessly, than prudence advised. And until he testifies and the investigation is clarified, we will live in this debate. Now, that the suspicion of lawfare is plausible, everyone knows and it is a prophecy.There is no doubt that the blow to Sanchez is tremendous. If yesterday we were talking about the PNB saying there should be elections this year, today we have Felipe Gonzalez (who else?) saying the same thing.Journalist: “Do you think there will be elections? Do you think there will not be elections?”Felipe González: “I think there should be. It is the first time I say it. I think there should be. I think there should be. That is to say, there should be this year. We should also have respect for the infantry. I would tell it to García Páez. Look, the leadership I value is non-mercenary leadership. That which is not exercised for one's own benefit, but is exercised for the benefit of others”. With friends like González who needs enemies, Sánchez must think. Because, moreover, he is amused by it.Felipe González: “I don’t see him, let’s say, with the capacity to set up a financial engineering as I am seeing. I say, listen, that this means nothing more than that. That Zapatero has reached, in his life trajectory, to know what an offshore company is, well, I don’t see it”.Tomorrow we will know what Sánchez's answer is when asked if he will advance the elections (which until today the answer was no, by no means). And they will ask him in Rome, where Sánchez will be received in audience by Pope Leo XIV, as a prelude to the trip to Madrid, Barcelona and the Canary Islands in fifteen days. Such is life, Sánchez standing up to the Holy Father, just as the Pope, one year after his election, has begun to raise his voice against liars like Trump and, yesterday, against the dangers of artificial intelligence.

Today we will have new revelations about the judicial investigation into the lobbying activity of former Spanish president Zapatero, because the judge will deliver to the parties everything that is in the initiated summary. And, of course, with new revelations the pressure on Sánchez's government to step down will increase. On this front there is a significant novelty: the PNB, through its president, Aitor Esteban, said yesterday that it would be “irresponsible” for Sanchez to want to exhaust the legislature in 2027, that is to say, that in view of everything that has emerged (the Zapatero case, but also the Cerdán and Ábalos cases) it would be imprudent to want to go beyond this year.What Esteban is telling Sánchez is that he should not abuse his patience and the deadlock in which the parties that voted for the socialist president's investiture find themselves: it is unlikely that the PNB, Junts, and not to mention the so-called "plurinational lefts" will vote for Feijóo as president of the government with Vox in a motion of censure, but if corruption continues to tarnish Sánchez, it is the Spanish president who should be obliged to call early elections. After all, Sánchez came to power with a motion of censure after corruption drowned Rajoy and the PP government.As always happens in these cases, now there are voices demanding that the law better define the limits between lobbying and falling into the crime of influence peddling. And the convenience of rescuing the airline Plus Ultra during the pandemic is also reviewed in hindsight, because it was not essential for air traffic between Spain and Latin America. If it wasn't, why did they rescue it? The PSOE is crossing its fingers so that the judge hasn't found anything else and can recover the discourse of "lawfare" (a possibility that, given what we have seen in the Spanish justice system, would not be so dismissible), but everyone you talk to tells you that, at the very least, Zapatero acted very much on the edge.While the socialists are crossing their fingers that nothing else comes up, in our country, tomorrow there will be another meeting between the Government and the education unions. The teachers' strikes are more than a stone in the government's shoe, they are a boulder in the road that doesn't let it continue to move with confidence and optimism after having been able to present a budget that will be approved. We are at the end of the sports seasons, and Catalonia has lost a team in the First Football Division, Girona. After having reached the Champions League, it drops to the Second Division: the team could not withstand the departure of key players who had made a name for themselves. Not all news is bad. Two Catalans succeeding in the world: the Barça women's football team, which tonight was received in Barcelona by 10,000 people after having won the Champions League, the fourth in the Club's history, in a perfect season that includes all three Spanish titles. And wait, because Alexia Putellas, after Saturday's Champions League, could very well win the Ballon d'Or again. For the visibility of professional women's sport, the service Barça is providing is extraordinary. And Pep Guardiola, who yesterday was bid farewell at City's stadium after 10 years as its manager. The mark Guardiola has left on football can only be defined by "a before and an after"; this can be said of very few managers in history. By the way, both celebrations, that of the Barça players and that of the Santpedor coach, were united by the estelada:

Images from this morning, when the Government met in extraordinary executive council to approve the budgetsMeanwhile, the teachers' strike continues, as we explain. The teachers' unions are not letting up. The negotiation between the Government and the union representatives will continue today: they remain stuck on improving salaries and, despite the wear and tear that maintaining the stoppages means, the unions are determined to continue them.

Today we will start with good news: congratulations to actress Aina Clotet, who has been awarded the Revelation Prize of the Critics' Week at the Cannes Film Festival. I find the will and capacity of this 44-year-old artist to be constantly working remarkable, now as the director of Viva, the story of a woman who throws herself into living intensely after overcoming cancer. Congratulations to Clotet.

This afternoon, the Government and education unions are meeting, to see if they can reach an agreement to call off the mobilizations that continue to be scheduled for the coming weeks and until the end of the school year. The Government has proposed advancing by one year the salary increase agreed with UGT and CCOO, more money for tutoring allowances, and a reinforcement of staff for inclusive schools. Positions are far apart. The conflict seems far from being resolved. However, the Government breathes more calmly after securing the 'yes' from Esquerra to the budgets.But the political news continues to be strongly conditioned by Zapatero's indictment, which has fallen like a bomb on Sánchez's government. Because Zapatero was, as Feijóo told Sánchez this morning, "his moral compass." In the control session of the Spanish government in the Congress of Deputies, a defensive Sánchez was seen. Listening to him, whether he was answering Feijóo or Rufián, it seems clear that Zapatero's indictment is already hitting the government's core, that there are not many more arguments left in Moncloa to defend themselves, and that it is now all about repeating that the elections will be next year and will not be brought forward.Where does this impression come from? Well, from the fact that instead of convincingly denying any possibility of corruption, Sánchez recalled Zapatero's merits: that he ended ETA, that he took Spain out of the Iraq war, that he got same-sex marriage approved… Even, Sánchez has brought out the worn-out card of Feijóo's photos on a narco's boat, in Galicia, years ago. And Feijóo has felt brave enough to twist Aznar's call to action (“he who can, let him do it”) and has transformed it into “he who can, let him steal”.Then it was Rufián's turn to ask, who with a desolate tone, as if someone in his family had died, almost implored Sánchez to give “some answer”. To Zapatero, the man who defeated the PP against all odds that very tough weekend in March 2004, the populars really want him. But today, in Congress, the feeling has been that the imputation of justice has decimated the reserves of conviction, which were already meager, that remained in the Spanish left.Good morning.

Before talking about the signing of the budget agreement between Illa and Junqueras, this morning we had two bombshell news. The Mossos d'Esquadra have arrested Jonathan Andic, the son of Mango founder Isak Andic, for the death of his father, who died at 71 while hiking in the Salnitre caves. Although initially treated as an accident, a few months ago the Mossos began investigating Andic's son for homicide, who was the only person with whom the businessman was that day. And while we were still processing the news, the political bombshell arrived: Zapatero has been charged with influence peddling, criminal organization, and document forgery in the case of the Plus Ultra airline bailout. The company was bailed out by Sánchez's government during the pandemic with a loan of 53 million euros. Now the National Court is charging Zapatero for having influenced (having received a commission of 10 million, deposited in an account in Panama) this bailout. He has always denied it, and Sánchez has always said the bailout was done correctly. The group that reported Zapatero was the far-right group Manos Limpias. Today, his office was searched, and he will have to appear to testify in 15 days. The first pieces of evidence, which became known this morning when the secrecy of the investigation was lifted, do not seem very solid. He is the first former Spanish president to be charged in Spain (Rajoy has been charged in Andorra). The impact for Sánchez is huge: they are friends, Zapatero supports him - unlike Felipe González -, and if we add to this the result in Andalusia, the funeral in Moncloa continues today. And I would bet anything that within 24 hours someone will remember that Zapatero was negotiating with Puigdemont (like Santos Cerdán). Meanwhile, this morning, at 8 o'clock, President Salvador Illa and Oriol Junqueras were at the Palau de la Generalitat and shook hands again, as a prelude to the photo of the day, that of the signing of the agreement between the Government and Esquerra Republicana by which Junqueras' party will approve the 2026 budgets of Illa's government. These are days of handshakes. Yesterday they already had the first one in Sant Sadurní d'Anoia at the presentation of the orbital train.As always, when a party gives a vote as important as the budget vote to a government, the debate is whether it has settled for little or a lot. Especially since Esquerra is an independentist party and the PSC is not, and it enthusiastically supported 155. Firstly, I think no one should be surprised that Esquerra or Comuns approve accounts for the PSC, because the most important agreement was already made, which is the investiture. If there was any incoherence in ERC's support for the PSC, it was then, not now. I believe that if you vote for someone's investiture, you have an obligation to cooperate with them during the legislature that other parties do not have. Whoever invests is saying they see potential. The fact is that for some time now, we have naturally accepted that, for example, next year there will be no budgets because there are municipal and Spanish elections and, of course, parties cannot support each other. Perhaps this is what is done nowadays, but I find it very selfish on the part of the parties. From this point of view, it is normal for Esquerra to give its vote to the Government. 

Today it is Barcelona's turn in the teachers' protests and the strikers have gathered in one of the most visible places in the city, the Sagrada Família. These strikes that teachers are carrying out by regions are multiplying the effect of the sector in struggle and are making the crisis long for the Government.Meanwhile, the Government is preparing for this week, which will be the staging of the budget agreement between the Government, Esquerra and Comuns.While Esquerra is convening the national council today to give the green light to the budgets, President Salvador Illa is going to Sant Sadurní d’Anoia today to present the initiative for the orbital railway line, the result of the agreement between the Government and Esquerra.

Yesterday we told you in this space that “it would be good for the Minister of the Interior to limit herself to apologizing and saying that it will not happen again”. And in the afternoon, in Parliament, Núria Parlon said: "I do want to apologize, and apologize to the educational union, in this case the CGT, for this feeling of distrust and insecurity that this has generated in relation to your assembly work and in relation to your organization and protest rights".Apologizing is an effective move because it lowers the tone of public controversy and reduces the discomfort of the offended party who is asking for explanations. An apology from a politician always makes for a bigger headline. And everyone understands that those responsible admit a mistake and, furthermore, everyone can imagine that something like this will not happen again. And the truth is that the way political communication is done nowadays, it is quite infrequent: have you ever heard Trump or Ayuso apologize?Therefore, the councilor's apology is correct, but in politics everything has a meaning. Firstly, the Government is in full negotiation with the teachers' unions (today specifically, they are sitting at the negotiation table), and these days, the Government is closing the budget agreement with Esquerra. Parlon had very powerful incentives to lower her head and tone.And now let's get to the facts: some Mossos agents infiltrated in a teachers' assembly and were discovered. The Director General of the Mossos, Josep Lluís Trapero, also acknowledges the mistake and even speaks of naivety.Josep Lluís Trapero: "But in the same way that I acknowledge the error or lack of opportunity, I do not acknowledge bad faith or an antidemocratic attitude in that operation. I emphasize again: I acknowledge the error in the lack of opportunity. And, if you wish, even the naivety of the decision".The minister and director spoke of a “poorly planned operational maneuver”. In other words, there was no political order, but rather a usual modus operandi (the minister spoke of “inertias”) that was poorly resolved. And this morning, on TV3, she said that the police had the right to use an “undercover agent”, a figure recognized by law, that the method used the other day is not the appropriate one, that there are “more appropriate police legal figures when you have a risk”.Therefore, what the political leadership of the Mossos says is that the infiltration was a mistake by the uniformed officers (not the politicians), who acted routinely, without anyone with sufficient rank assessing whether or not it was necessary to spy on an assembly from which a mobilization would emerge that is often announced in the media. It must be said: whether it is a mistake by the police officers who execute or by the politicians who rule, the ultimate responsible for anything the police do are the politicians. And, obviously, the Mossos will continue to infiltrate, as all police forces in the world do. Meanwhile, today it's the teachers' strike in Girona and Central Catalonia. And the minister is meeting with teacher unions today. May it go well, because this will be good for everyone.Good morning.

The teachers' protests continue, who this morning have again blocked roads and access to Barcelona. Tomorrow, finally, they will meet with the Government. The Department of Education says there is no room to improve salaries beyond 200 euros per month, but everything seems to indicate that the Government will indeed put more money on the table to improve the inclusive school service, the model that aims to guarantee education for all students regardless of their personal abilities, family origins, or social and economic conditions. Let's hope they succeed (it seems impossible for the conflict to be resolved in the first meeting) but Salvador Illa's Government would do well to show that it understands that it cannot pretend everything will be fine thanks to the magic of a government that doesn't want noise.

Today is the first of the 17 days of strikes that teachers have called. Their stoppage not only impacts students and families who are left without classes: at a quarter past seven in the morning, the striking teachers have cut off traffic in places like Mataró, Manresa, Vic, and especially, at the entrances to Barcelona, very particularly on the Ronda de Dalt, and then in the city center. Among teachers there is the conviction that it is now or never, that they have been holding up the educational system for a long time, that they do not have reinforcements in classrooms, that they are increasingly complex, and that salaries are low considering the responsibility they have, and that while the salaries of the Mossos have been reviewed, those of teachers have not.Regarding this, today we publish this interview with the spokesperson for USTEC, Iolanda Segura, with a very clear headline: “With 400 euros per month we could talk about raising the protest”. Pay attention, however, to a couple of details. First, the nuance. The spokesperson says: “If it is scheduled that 200 euros are already this first year and then the rest in two or three more years, we could finish negotiating and see what the collective tells us. But what is non-negotiable is 200 euros in four years, which everyone knows perfectly well that it neither places us at the forefront of salaries in the rest of the communities nor reverses the salary loss”. And the other detail is that it's not all about salaries. What else could provoke the protest? The union leader says: “Regarding staff numbers, the agreement includes a series of measures that we negotiated ourselves, such as reducing ratios and providing resources for educational centers and for inclusive education. We are talking about figures that are both labor and teaching, special education educators, integration specialists, TEEI (specialist technician in early childhood education) and psychopedagogues”. It is important to note, therefore, that teachers are demanding improvements that go beyond economic ones. I say this because the polarization, for and against teachers, without nuances, which mixes things like having two months of vacation, has reached the dozens of comments the news has received.I believe it is fundamental that we look further, and of course, do so without starting from likes or dislikes. It may be annoying that they block traffic or demand more money, but teachers are focusing on a core problem, that of education. A problem means what is taught, how it is taught, and what educational and future job value for students the content taught in Catalan schools has. If we talk about education, for a long time now no one here is happy: the Government wants to reverse the results of the PISA report, we have concluded that the teaching career is neither sufficiently demanding nor sufficiently recognized, the postal district weighs heavily on the students' school reality, the job market cannot find well-prepared people... And it's not new, it's been a long time that with all kinds of governments, teaching has been fertile ground for the dissatisfaction of its protagonists. And thus, as a society, we cannot continue. And the Government, even less so. What a mistake it was to bring the spotlights and cameras to the signing of an agreement with unions that were not the majority ones, as if to say that everything is fine, madam baroness. Well, no, it is not, and we will hear about it during 17 days of strike, three of which are general education strikes, between now and the end of the school year.Good morning.

This morning, sports, Barça, gave us a reason to create a cheerful cover, that of theThe result has been another night of celebration for a fanbase that, unlike what happens in so many other aspects of the country, has high self-esteem. We hope that the adherence to Catalan identity that Barça has provided in a society of immigration continues to function thanks to these successes and the identification with this very young and very normal team. Another good piece of news: the PCR test on the Catalan woman who has been in isolation at the Hospital Clínic since Saturday has come back negative for hantavirus. The woman was admitted for quarantine because she had been in the same plane for a few minutes with the Dutch woman who contracted it on board the cruise ship and who ended up dying.The woman continues to show no symptoms and, in accordance with epidemiological surveillance protocols, will remain confined and under observation at the Clínic for prevention. In seven days, another PCR will be performed to confirm the negative result.And here we return to the harsh reality: from today onwards, the Rodalies service is once again subject to a charge. (It has always been subject to a charge, of course, we all pay for it: we are referring to the user's direct payment). Payment in exchange for what? The trains run when they want, the timetables are an intention, but of course, in many journeys, the train is a bus. The improvement of the service is being slow. It is clear that due to the harsh reality of education. A week of strikes in schools and institutes begins. Relations between the department and the unions are very tense. The only thing missing was for the unions to find out from the radio that the counselor wanted to see them on Thursday. They will meet on Thursday and, on top of that, we have the scandal of the infiltration of two Mossos agents into a teachers' assembly that we already talked about last Friday. Now that more details are known, apart from what it has of authoritarian regime espionage, it is even more humiliating that the police were discovered on such a simple mission.Let's see if it solves things a bit that we have budgets for this 2026. Late, but we will have budgets. So once the Andalusian elections have passed on Sunday, PSC and Esquerra will be able to present their agreement. It is scandalous, but Catalanophobia sets the pace of Spanish politics. Moreno Bonilla is campaigning to preside over Andalusia by constantly talking about Catalonia. After the breakdown weeks ago due to the new financing system for Catalonia, Esquerra set out to find a striking agreement. There is talk of a transfer of powers from the State, but in the meantime, Junqueras has explained that the agreement will include a train, curiously. This: An orbital axis that connects Maresme with Garraf, passing through the two Vallesos, Baix Llobregat and Penedès. In black the sections that exist and in yellow those that should be built. We are talking about up to 5,000 million euros of investment, which the State should largely provide. The project is old, but now they have taken it out of the drawer where it was sleeping.Good morning.

The Spanish government is shining with the public differences of opinion maintained by the Ministries of Health and Defense on whether quarantine is mandatory or not for people who have been in contact with infected individuals by hantavirus. And it is true that the procedures for the outbreak were activated late and poorly, and here we are, urgently searching for passengers who were in contact with the infected and counting cases of people who have isolated themselves in Singapore or are under surveillance in the United States. But what I find unbearable is the political outcry, practically hysteria, surrounding the case. The Canary Islands government does not want the ship in port (as if they were not bringing the affected people to port); Ayuso – who is now dedicated to imitating Pedro Sánchez to play on the international stage as a reference for the most rancid right-wing and goes to Mexico to defend Hernán Cortés to see if she provokes a global scandal – wonders why they have to bring affected people to Madrid (as if they didn't have a reference hospital there), and the PP goes around shouting "This is chaos!" It is a shame, because we know that hantavirus is not like covid – the WHO has said so –, and we live in a developed country, a member of the European Union, with the capacity to treat this disease. We come from a pandemic in which many people suffered a lot and became very anxious, which triggered mental illnesses, and now what would be appropriate would be to have a sense of state. When a crisis is still open, one must think twice about the messages and leave the criticism for when it is resolved.Regarding open crises, the war in Iran continues but has already reached levels of confusion that begin to resemble that Gila war, where a general would pick up the phone and ask for the enemy. At this moment, officially, the ceasefire holds, but the United States and Iran continue to exchange attacks. Trump doesn't know how to end this war, to which he was dragged by Israel, which is making gasoline more expensive for him and, therefore, angering his voters. That's why he continues to say things from the height of a bell tower, opening controversies and alternative fires, such as when he said that the Pope was endangering many Catholics because he didn't care if Iran had the atomic bomb. But the Pope put him in his place with a sentence destined to go down in the history of his pontificate: “If anyone wants to criticize me for announcing the Gospel, let them do so with the truth, because the Church has spoken out against all nuclear weapons for years, and there is no doubt about it.” Very well said.Another political crisis: teaching unions have reported detecting undercover police officers at teachers' assemblies. An explanation from the Government is urgently needed. It would be unacceptable, typical of an authoritarian regime. This morning, when asked about the matter on SER, President Illa brushed it off saying the minister would provide explanations, implying the president knows nothing and has no reason to know anything. It doesn't look good, especially in the midst of the labor conflict between teachers and the department, as it seems they were spying on them. I certainly think explanations are needed.

In a month, on June 9th, the Pope will arrive in Catalonia, where he will spend the night, and will leave the next day. He will arrive at El Prat airport on Tuesday, June 9th, at half past twelve, and from there he will go to Barcelona Cathedral to hold a prayer. The next public stop will be at 8 p.m. at the Lluís Companys Olympic Stadium for a massive prayer vigil. According to the organization, the option of it being at Camp Nou was considered, but FC Barcelona's board of directors ruled it out because the logistics involved delaying the stadium's construction by a month. The following day, Wednesday, June 10th, the Pope will visit Brians 1 prison, in Sant Esteve Sesrovires, and from there he will go up to Montserrat, where he will lead a prayer and have lunch with the community of monks. In the afternoon he will return to Barcelona, to the church of Sant Agustí, in the Raval (the Pope is from the Augustinian order). At half past seven, the moment that will be most broadcast worldwide will arrive, the mass at the Sagrada Família, which is a television setting that never ends. At the end of the mass – it will be half past eight in the evening –, with the twilight sun, he will bless from the street the tower of Jesus Christ, crowned weeks ago and which has made the Sagrada Família the tallest temple in the world. The next day, Thursday, June 11th, he will leave for Las Palmas. Pope Robert Prevost will have arrived in Madrid on the 6th and will return to Rome from the Canary Islands on the 12th.This trip is curious because the reason for bringing him to Spain at this time is the Sagrada Família. On June 10th, it will be 100 years since Gaudí's death, and to solemnize the centenary, the Pope has agreed to go to Barcelona to bless the tower of Jesus Christ, which crowns the basilica. Thus, it is from this date and this act that the entire trip is organized. In Madrid, he will go to the Congress of Deputies, where he will deliver a speech in a joint session of the Congress and the Senate. One can imagine the interest Pedro Sánchez's government must have in the Pope giving a political speech, because he is against war, he is attacked by Trump, and he has warned the Spanish bishops not to be instrumentalized by the far-right. The trip has a very marked social component, because Leo XIV will go to a shelter for homeless people in Madrid, he will go to prison, he will go to the Raval in Barcelona, and he will end up in the Canary Islands, the entry point – often fatal – for sub-Saharan immigration into the European Union. It is a trip that Pope Francis could have made if he had not been so ill in the final years of his pontificate.  It is noticeable in the program that, apart from being very packed, it is the typical trip of the Pope to Spain, very controlled so that it is exactly that, a trip to Spain: the kings will accompany him at every step, they will receive him at the Royal Palace in Madrid, he will meet with Pedro Sánchez (a photo that Sánchez is eager to have). Yesterday, the cardinal of Barcelona, Omella, dodged the question when asked about the use of Catalan during the trip. It is the usual thing, the undisguised influence in the Vatican of the Spanish episcopate so that the distinct personality of Catalonia and its language are not perceived as merely regional. I do not believe, however, that Catalan Catholic sectors will stand idly by to counteract this new episode of surveillance of the Pope's words in Catalonia, which, frankly, at this point in history we could do without.And as everything is susceptible of worsening, the “Christian lawyers” appear to ask that the Pope not go to the Lluís Companys Stadium, because under his presidency thousands of religious men and women were killed, and they finish by saying that “it is outrageous that the Pope himself goes to a stadium that honors a murderer”. Needless to say, Companys not only did not have anyone killed, but he tried to save many people, but on July 18, 1936, and in the following months, the president of the Generalitat was absolutely overwhelmed by the armed violence of groups of anarchists and the extreme left, who were the authors of the assassinations. In short, as if the lie were not big enough, the same group asks the Pope to go to the Valley of the Fallen. The Pope's visit, therefore, has political, cultural, social, national, and security components (as the world is) of great importance and symbolism. We will follow it closely.Good morning.

Today is the first day of the teachers' strikes with which the school year will end badly. There are conversations between the Government and the teachers' unions, but publicly we are still in the phase of a tug-of-war between the two positions and, therefore, the end of the conflict is not in sight. The counselor went to TV3 this morning, she put on a brave face (as President Illa did in the last control session) and, apparently, we are in a “let's see who lasts longer”. And, despite everything, the Government is seeing firsthand the bitter reality of all the governments that have preceded it: Catalonia is very poorly financed and has no more room for maneuver.The future hangs from the school, which is almost like saying that everything hangs from it, including that of the Catalan language. In recent times, worried voices are heard about the ease with which Catalan-speaking children from Catalan-speaking families play, sing, and communicate in Spanish, or switch languages very easily, and there are people who suggest whether it would be better to separate students by language, so that teaching in Catalan is as little interfered with as possible. On this, I recommend the article signed today by political scientist Jordi Muñoz, which, under the title “Linguistic segregation?”, provides some data: Catalan is not losing speakers, it continues to gain new ones, but it lives in contact with a language, Spanish, which is gaining even more, and all the new Catalan speakers, of which there are some, do not compensate for the growth of the Spanish-speaking population. But Muñoz also says that “reducing contact between linguistic communities would further limit the incorporation of new speakers”. And he concludes by adding a surprising piece of data: “If only a third of Catalan speakers stopped switching languages when interacting with Spanish speakers, this would have the same impact on the social use of the language as a 10 percentage point increase in the demographic weight of Catalan speakers”. So, if only one third of Catalans kept speaking Catalan, this would have the effect of 10% more Catalan speakers. It would be good for Professor Muñoz to develop the idea, but it has to do with an empirical evidence that Carme Junyent already spoke about, who in an interview with Vilaweb four years ago said the following: “The best thing Catalan has now, and which is the great hope, is that more than half of those who speak it do not have it as their first language. This is a gift that is difficult to achieve.” And she added: “Therefore, we should know how to value the fact that so many people have made the effort to learn Catalan, with all the dimension it has. But this means that we need a little patience, that we must be open to the possibility that they do not speak well while they speak. If people speak and we give them the opportunity to do so because we don't change languages, they will end up speaking well.”  We have said here many times that if Catalan is not legally essential to earn a living, it has a harder time being hegemonic. And that it is unfair to have to demand individual attitudes to make efforts that Spanish speakers do not have to make. But no one said that life was fair, much less perfect. It's no use demanding everything without doing anything. Or not doing much. And this, as Carme Junyent said: “Basically, it means always speaking in Catalan. Speaking in Catalan by default and if there are problems, we will solve them.”Good morning.

It was Saturday at eleven in the morning when a man repeatedly stabbed a woman in the back. Then he cut her throat. The Mossos investigation has not been able to determine that they knew each other: everything indicates that she was a victim chosen at random who had the worst of luck.

The poll we published in ARA this weekend dared to put numbers on the political reality, which, no matter how much scientific basis the work has, always ends up causing an endless discussion. Especially when there are still more than two years to go until the parliamentary elections, if the Illa government manages to complete the legislature, because the political, economic, and social situation is only getting more tangled.This is the first observation: the growing discontent would not be directed against the PSC, nor against Esquerra or Comuns, who support it, but would take the form of a historic shift of a large part of the country's electorate towards the far-right, curiously not large enough to force a change of government but sufficient to send Junts from second to fifth position.The growth of Alianza Catalana and Vox is more than probable (we'll see if in these proportions), and it's noticeable as soon as you step outside. The protest vote against everything, especially with the extraordinary increase in immigration that Catalonia has experienced, would take the form of the far-right, exactly as happens in all democracies. But the case of Catalonia, with its own political system and the strong influence of the Spanish political system, would present some elements to consider.The idea that ““és català tot aquell que viu i treballa a Catalunya (i ho vol ser)”” has been blown to pieces. A good part of the Catalanist voter doubts the strength that that powerful machine for “fer catalans”, which were the street, the school, the economy, the television, and the income difference with Spain, could now have, which without having its own state yielded extraordinary results. They doubt because countries with their own states like France and the United Kingdom have many problems, and because the mix of an immigrant influx, a digital cultural bubble, religious differences, and the marginalization of Catalan in schools and the legal inferiority of the language seems like a perfect storm for Catalan identity. And however aggressive Aliança Catalana's expressions towards Muslims may be, a sense of urgency prevails. In the case of Vox, the growth factors would be the Spanish nationalist reaction to immigration, to separatism, and to Pedro Sánchez's government, which is dragging on for them. Economic problems for many families, uncertainty for young people, an inaccessible housing market, bleak prospects in the labor market, artificial intelligence... The punishment vote, on the contrary, is served.It is not so strange that Orriols and Rufián are the best-rated politicians. To be rated, you first have to be known, and Rufián's star has not stopped growing, especially in Spain, and from this Spanish circuit, he grows in Catalonia. And Orriols, although less known, is on everyone's lips. However, personal rating and votes do not always go together. History is full of highly rated but poorly voted politicians.Good morning.

The socialist Government of Salvador Illa is ostentatiously stumbling over education. It is not new. The republican government of Aragonès, with counselor González-Cambray at the head of the department, also stumbled over it. But in reality, and this is the most serious thing, it is the whole country, the whole society, the future of our country, that is stumbling over education.Let's go step by step. Look at this page: Salvador Illa assumes the challenge of teachers. The president defends the agreement with CCOO and UGT and without USTEC. We have a labor dispute with the teachers that in the month and a half remaining of the course will provide us with 17 days of various strikes, about five per school center. So we have a Government that is playing hardball (negotiating stance) but which has made the mistake of overestimating the importance of a pact with unions that, in education, are not the majority. This, at a time when almost half of the aspiring teachers have failed the aptitude test. Only 54% of students have passed the exams to be able to take the selectivity exam and access education degrees. The good part is that we have tests that filter the most capable students. The bad part is that such generally low grades say something worrying about how competent students arrive at our universities.While we are still pondering this news, we turn the page and find that the industry warns that with the current training they cannot fill 15,000 positions a year. In other words, we have jobs, but we don't have prepared people. And Catalan industry has been like this for decades. Well, it is in the midst of all this that the Government wants to incorporate Mossos into schools, in plain clothes, to help teachers with security and mediation tasks. The debate in Parliament yesterday went like this: Salvador Illa: I accept that you don't see what this is about, I accept it. If I had seen what this is about, as president, I would say let's go ahead and do it throughout Catalonia. We are saying "let's do a proof of concept". This is what we are saying. And if the centers don't want to do it, it won't be done. What fear do they have of trying it?Mònica Sales : In schools, authority is needed, yes. That of the teachers, not that of the police. They already do a good job where it matters.Jéssica Albiach: These centers do not need police officers. What they need are psychologists, social educators, integrators, to lower the ratios, for the coordinators of coexistence and well-being to have exclusive dedication and specific training, and for the Plan against Child Poverty to work. That is what they need.Pilar Castillejo : You are assuming a mental framework and a way of doing things that is not characteristic of public school, but rather of the far right.Amidst a conflict with teachers, amidst very unpromising results from aspiring teachers or students in PISA tests, and from batches of graduates facing the labor needs of the industry, the Government opens the can of worms of having Mossos in schools and finds, of course, that teachers are asking for more specialists, not security personnel, no matter how much mediation they know how to do (which the Mossos do) and that it is done in other countries. It has been decades that something is not going well in the education of this country, which has to do with growing social complexity, the social valuation of the work of teachers, the constant changes in educational laws, the economic and material resources available, the unionization of their demands, the difficulty for dialogue in a world that feels unfairly criticized and is very susceptible to any external force. Finding trust and consensus to improve education is a matter of life or death for the country.Good morning.