With no support in Madrid and none in Catalonia either. That's how hard the road ahead is for the star proposal of the president of Catalonia, Pere Aragonès, who in his initial speech in Parliament in the framework of the general policy debate proposed a clarity agreement to achieve a referendum agreed upon with the Spanish state, in line with the accord reached in Canada in 2000 after Quebec had held two unilateral referendums. With unusual speed, not even an hour had passed when the Spanish government palace ruined any possibility that there was a viable path for Aragonès in this regard. It was not necessary for the PP, Vox and Ciudadanos to say anything, since the game, at least in this phase, had already ended. The same thing happened in Catalonia: only the Comuns gave it a certain amount of support, conditional on there being a broader consensus and, obviously, on getting the support from Junts that it lacks.
Despite the fact that Aragonès, in it for the long haul, showed himself prepared to persevere in his proposal and follow a path similar to that of the dialogue table - willing to give it as long as it takes, despite the absence of progress on the goals of an amnesty and a referendum - the omens are not good. Nor were they in the past when others proposed it: the Comuns in 2018 in a debate similar to the one on Tuesday and, in addition, they carry it in their electoral manifesto as their spokesperson Jéssica Albiach has noted; the then speaker of parliament and now business minister, Roger Torrent, in 2019 at a breakfast conference; and, much earlier, in 2016, it was even raised by the then leader of the Catalan Socialists and current Spanish minister of culture, Miquel Iceta. The Socialists turned against Iceta, going so far as to propose that he choose between the PSOE and the referendum, and he quickly backed away from the plan. Salvador Illa, who surely remembers what happened to his party colleague then, has chosen not to give the proposal the slightest credibility, inviting Aragonès to leave behind his unviable promises.
Once the star proposal of the day had been spelt out, the debate had three elements of interest. The disagreement with Junts, the announcement by Valencian Socialist Ximo Puig of his tax reduction plan and the economic measures to fight the crisis. The intervention of Albert Batet was harsh and forceful, in line with the enthusiasm that the Junts leadership has for going into battle over their continuance in the executive and the coldness of Aragonès in allowing them an easy exit, which would permit their adversaries to appear as the great winners. It is difficult to pin a medal on yourself for taking action when your rival prefers that you take it and, in addition, it would be you that would end up labelled as the destroyer of a pro-independence government.
The guest appearance of the session came from the Corts Valencianes, where the president of the Valencian Generalitat, Ximo Puig, announced a significant tax reduction, highly focused on personal income tax for incomes of less than 60,000 euros. By magic, tax reduction ceased to be a right-wing issue and the left, through Puig, also signed up for it, leading a government that includes Compromís and Unidas Podemos. There will be very few who fail to benefit from Puig's tax proposal if the PSOE does not force him to withdraw it: 97% of citizens will be affected in one way or another. It is likely that Puig has seen the proposal to lower taxes as a lifeline to re-election at the head of the Valencian executive in the face of the rise of the People's Party. I do not know. But his attack has bothered the Spanish administration and has now, from the left, stirred up the same hornets' nest that Isabel Díaz Ayuso from Madrid and Juanma Moreno from Andalusia already given a good kick from the right.
Aragonès's resistance to opening the can of worms on tax reductions - Junts has it in its manifesto and it was approved at the last party congress - thus has an expiry date, and it is only a question of time. In the afternoon, Galicia also jumped on the bandwagon with its proposal to reduce personal income tax on income below 30,000 euros. Somewhere, at some point, the loss of purchasing power by the Catalan public will have to be compensated for in the face of the unstoppable rise in inflation, and looking the other way is not the solution. The economic measures passed, such as the extension of the T-Jove transport pass from age limit 20 to a limit of 30, has also been trumped by Ximo Puig's proposal for free public transport for those aged up to 30.
One last note. While former Catalan president Jordi Pujol is recovering from his stroke at home, with outpatient visits to the Guttmann Institute, it is surprising that first Salvador Illa, from the PSC, and later Carles Riera, from the CUP, recalled the man who was head of the Generalitat between 1980 and 2003 during the general policy debate and quoted him in glowing terms. The first, encouraging Aragonès to travel abroad - "Travel, and with dignity. Jordi Pujol set the bar very high" - and, the second, pointing out that Pujol would have been more forceful and daring than Aragonès in this parliamentary debate.