July will be a thrilling month for the Ministry of Finance. Not only because it has put underway the machinery to present the 2027 budgets –with the vote on the stability path in Congress and the presentation of the spending ceiling–, but because it will be key to the funding model. After almost two years of negotiation with Esquerra and the Generalitat, this week the ministry plans to send the draft of the new funding system law in writing and July 29th minister Arcadi Spain will make it official in a new meeting of the Council of Fiscal and Financial Policy. And it will be at this meeting that all common-regime autonomies (the Basque Country and Navarre are excluded) will vote against the model, with the exception of Catalonia.

"Cutting down trees is not a crime", said Salvador Illa this Monday in an interview with RAC1. The President of the Generalitat called for a "change of mentality" in forest management and argued that "the forest must be managed". A few months ago, Parliament modified part of a Government decree on measures related to the agricultural and forestry sector. What exactly changed?

Franco had just died, Arias Navarro was still president and the country lived between hope and fear. In this context, fifty years ago, the Rally for Freedom was held, the first major democratic political event authorized in Catalonia since the end of the war, which boosted the PSC and gathered 15,000 people. Raimon Obiols (Barcelona, 1940) was one of the participants and this year the Government, through the Directorate General of Democratic Memory, and the Rafael Campalans Foundation paid tribute to him at the Barcelona Bar Association.

Salvador Illa will reach the midpoint of the legislature with the political stability he sought. This Thursday, Parliament has definitively approved the budgets that he agreed upon a few weeks ago with Esquerra and Comuns, the two investiture partners, who this morning added their votes to validate the first accounts of the socialist government – Junts deputy Noemí Nieto also voted in favor by mistake. Accounts that will reach almost 50,000 million euros, 22% more than those of 2023, the last project still approved under the presidency of Pere Aragonès. This Thursday's plenary session also validated the budget accompanying law, which includes, among other things, increasing the tourist tax to 30 euros per day for cruise ships calling at Barcelona and creating the Catalan Airport Authority. Illa thus guarantees himself to reach the end of the legislature with updated budgets and a parliamentary majority that requires the Government to continue for its agreements to be fulfilled.

The PSC, Esquerra and Comuns have reached an agreement to increase the tourist tax for cruise ships calling at Barcelona. Through an amendment to the Generalitat's budget accompanying law, presented this Tuesday in Parliament, the three groups will force an increase in the tax to 30 euros for ships that are less than 12 hours in the Catalan capital.

In a month's time, Salvador Illa's government will have approved the first budgets of the legislature. An agreement with Comuns and ERC that gives the executive breathing room and certifies that this is currently the only viable majority in Catalonia. Republicans and Comuns already invested Illa and, despite the tug-of-war of the last two years, they continue to be the partners that give him stability. Even to avoid inconvenient appearances by the president in Parliament. This Tuesday, for the second consecutive week, ERC, Comuns, and the PSC prevented the chamber from summoning Illa. Junts wanted him to appear to explain the role of the Generalitat in the crisis opened with public school teachers. Seven days ago, the Junts, with the support of PP and Vox, demanded that the president respond for the cases of alleged corruption that splash the PSOE (and that the judge does not rule out entirely that they have a derivative in the PSC).

The Tax Agency already has on the table a series of requests from the National Court to review the PSOE's accounts, but, on the other hand, it will not have to do so with those of the PSC. Judge Santiago Pedraz has finally excluded the Catalan socialists from the tax requirements, even though the Civil Guard insisted on including the PSC in the investigation. From the PSOE, and from the people implicated in the Leire case, the magistrate is looking for bank accounts, deposits, withdrawals or cash payments and invoices.

I don't know if the two Tanzanian priests and the two Filipinos who make up the Augustinian community in Barcelona will tell Leo XIV, when he visits the church of Sant Agustí in the Raval on June 10, that it was in that church that the Assembly of Catalonia was founded, the great coalition of anti-Franco forces in the country. It was the year 1971. Time was time. When the Catalan Church stood shoulder to shoulder with those fighting for individual and collective freedoms. When rectors sheltered striking workers and prevented the "grisos" from entering. When Comissions Obreres was founded in a parish (Sant Medir, la Bordeta, 1964), when students barricaded themselves in convents (la Caputxinada, Sarrià, 1966), or the most symbolic monastery was the chosen setting to "christen" a party that would govern Catalonia for decades (Convergència, Montserrat, 1974). It was the time of Escarré, Jubany, Cassià Maria Just, Xirinacs, Ragué, Ballarín, and many worker priests... It was a time when the Church had a better reputation than it does today. More practitioners, more religious vocations, more complicity with laypeople, more credibility, no reports of pedophilia.

The PSOE headquarters on Ferraz street in Madrid woke up to the visit of agents from the Operational Action Unit of the Civil Guard. They carried a judicial order for them to be provided with a whole series of information linked to a case under secrecy that the National Court has been investigating for months. In the event that the socialists had refused to provide the documentation to the police, they even had a signed authorization to search the party headquarters. What was Judge Santiago Pedraz looking for there?

"Out of institutional respect, I remind you that the natural language is Catalan and, if you do not know it, I inform you that there are places available at the adult school. If you wish, I can give you an enrollment form." In this way, the mayor of Ripoll, Sílvia Orriols, reprimanded the new councilor of the PSC, Jorge Iglesias, who was debuting in the plenary session yesterday, for making his speech in Spanish. In a subsequent intervention, Morillo responded that he would do "the possible to learn Catalan", but asked the leader of Aliança Catalana that she "do the possible to carry out social actions". It all began when Iglesias, a retiree born in Montevideo and linked to the Ripollès region, intervened in the swearing-in and assured that he would carry out his activity "with the corresponding loyalty". The other socialist councilor, Paco Morillo, a resident of Ripoll, did not want to intervene in his debut as a councilor.

He won the last three elections in Catalonia, but the doors of the Generalitat remain closed to the PSC. At least until the next Catalan elections. The socialists are soaring in the polls and if elections were held today in Parliament, Salvador Illa would clearly win with between 39 and 45 seats, ahead of ERC (29-34) and Junts (19-24), who have been losing ground as the legislature progressed. The results are collected by the Barometer of the Center for Opinion Studies (CEO) which was made public today, the day after Pedro Sánchez's investiture, although the polls were conducted a few weeks ago, before the PSOE's agreements with ERC and Junts. in the July poll, the PSC was also first, but with an estimate of 31-37 seats, practically tied with Esquerra, which obtained between 31 and 36.

The first polls on the May 12 elections, published this Monday in El Español and La Razón, point to a clear victory for the PSC, with a majority of between 36 and 42 seats, and give second place to Junts, which would overtake ERC at the polls. According to these surveys, therefore, Pere Aragonès's party would be the main loser compared to the 2021 elections. The commons could also suffer the consequences of the early elections, protagonists in recent weeks of the legislature for their no

The PSC remains ahead in the polls a month and a half before the 12-M elections. Also in the latest barometer from the Centre d'Estudis d'Opinió (CEO) made public this Thursday, even though the poll was conducted before the announcement by the President of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, of advancing the elections. Be that as it may, if the parliamentary elections were held today, the socialists would revalidate the victory of three years ago and would aim to obtain between 35 and 42 seats, a slight setback compared to the November survey (the November poll) (39-45). Behind them would be ERC, with 26-32 seats and an average rating of its government by Catalans of 4.3 (the same as the Spanish government's). The Republicans see Junts approaching them, which would rise to 24-29 seats. The poll data was collected between February 9 and March 7. Precisely on the last day, the agreement for the amnesty law was materialized and approved in the Justice Commission of the Congress. During this period, the Koldo case also broke out, which implicates the former Minister of Transport, the socialist José Luis Ábalos, and in early February, farmers began to mobilize in the streets.

Either Pedro Sánchez with Yolanda Díaz or Alberto Núñez Feijóo with Santiago Abascal. This is the choice that the two main state blocs offer for July 23, and it seems that in Catalonia voters have a clear idea of who to lean towards. The PSC, with Meritxell Batet at the helm, would broadly win the elections and could climb to 16-18 seats, doubling the results of whoever ends up in second place. It would be the first socialist victory in general elections in Catalonia since 2008 when Carme Chacón achieved the party's best historical results with 25 deputies. In any case, the socialist victory in the Principality could end up being bitter if the PP dominates the State as a whole. The latest poll published, by the CIS, assures that nothing has been decided yet, although most polls place the Popular Party well above the Socialists. The CEO also detects a greater predisposition to participate than on other occasions in the general elections, which could reduce abstention in these elections.

The electoral cycle is tinged with blue. The PP has advanced strongly everywhere, but especially in Andalusia, the Valencian Country, and also in Madrid, both in regional and municipal elections. Now it is confident of doing the same in the general elections of July 23, as all surveys predict, including the CIS one. They are, along with Catalonia, the key territories to pave the way to Moncloa. For this reason, it is in the Principality that the socialists are playing a good part of their credit. Pedro Sánchez knows that the differential he achieves with the PP in Catalonia could end up being decisive, especially if he loses momentum in other autonomies. The PSC will win the elections by a wide margin, according to the survey that the Opinòmetre Institute has conducted for ARA. With a range of between 14 and 16 deputies, the socialists will return to first place fifteen years later. And what will be the differential with the PP? The popular party, also on the rise, capturing the majority of Cs' vote, would be left with between 5 and 7 deputies in the Spanish Parliament.

"Oh, it's difficult to say when the works will begin. It's a complex, very important and strategic line for the country. The urban planning part has been done since 2010 and now we will have to start with studies and projects. It won't be tomorrow; these infrastructures cost". These are statements by the Minister of Economy, Alícia Romero, to Catalunya Ràdio about the macro-project that has been decisive to unblock the approval of the budgets: the orbital railway line. ERC wants to reactivate a plan that has been in a drawer for twenty years to give its "yes" to the accounts. In fact, the Republicans present it as a future bet for a network that this year has experienced an unprecedented crisis and is still trying to recover some semblance of normality.

One of the mantras ERC resorts to in defining its relationship with the PSC is that of "gaining sovereignty". The Republicans explain that their agreements are based on achieving more resources, competences, and decision-making capacity for Catalonia. Have they achieved this? For now, through republican and socialist pushes and pulls, they have been unblocking some of the files agreed upon in the investitures of Salvador Illa (2024) and Pedro Sánchez (2023). However, they have found the solution in a mixed formula: establishing companies jointly owned by the Generalitat and the State, where the state administration has a majority.

Rarely (very rarely or never) do you attend the presentation of the same budget project twice in a year. This is what has happened on this occasion in Parliament, where the accounts for the remainder of the fiscal year have been submitted, after they were withdrawn last February due to disagreement with ERC.

After swallowing the bitter pill of withdrawing the first budgets he presented as President of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa is now, truly, beginning the path for Parliament to give the green light to the first accounts of the legislature. With the support of ERC and Comuns secured, Illa is ensuring one of his main objectives for the legislature. The accounts for this 2026 will be the Government's first and, perhaps, only ones, because 2027 is an election year, with municipal and general elections in sight, and 2028 is already his last year of the legislature, two scenarios not conducive to negotiating accounts. Therefore, having achieved these budgets, Illa is ensuring, for now, the continuity of the legislature.

The State and the Generalitat have signed this Wednesday the agreements with ERC for the Catalan budgets at the Bilateral Commission they held in Madrid, which lasted less than an hour. The Republicans set this condition to have a guarantee of compliance with the pacts that depend on Pedro Sánchez's executive, among which is the creation of an investment company, that is, a company that will be approved by the Council of Ministers during this 2026 and will be participated by both administrations. This company will serve to "provide greater agility, flexibility and operational capacity" for the execution of studies, projects and works linked to infrastructures and other public investments, as the Government explained in a press release. In parallel, however, they are not giving up on the possibility of moving forward with a "State-Generalitat parity consortium for investments" which would depend on the Ministry of Transport. For this to prosper, however, it requires the approval of Congress, where the proposal derailed a few weeks ago due to the opposing vote of Junts.