At the last minute, with the debate on the bill already underway in the Congress of Deputies and with documents being exchanged in the middle of the night, the Catalan Republican Left (ERC) and the Spanish government have unblocked their negotiation on the Spanish budget. ERC's 13 deputies will cast their affirmative votes for the approval of Spain's public accounts for the year ahead. In return, the Pedro Sánchez executive has committed itself on a whole host of issues. Among these, one of the most important: a minimum of 6% of the programme content on streaming platforms must be in Spain's co-official languages in the future state audiovisual law. With these votes, together with the four from PDeCAT, the numbers are working out for the Spanish treasury ministry. This Thursday the budget bill will finish its pass through Congress and move to the Senate.
Among the ten agreements reached, the outstanding matter relates to the protection of the Catalan language in the yet-to-be-passed audiovisual law. This was crucial for ERC. The party reports that it has agreed with the Spanish government on "the obligation to include a quota for co-official languages of 6% of the content offered on audiovisual platforms". To break it down, out of every 100 movies on (say) Netflix, 30 will have to be European productions. Of this 30%, half (ie,15%) must be in the languages of the Spanish state. Up to here, the bill is as it stood before the budget negotiations; what has been added is that, of the 15% in languages of the Spanish state, two out of every five programmes, that is 6% of the entire catalogue must be in Catalan, Basque or Galician. In parallel, if dubbing or subtitling in any co-official language for any given programme in the catalogue is available, that must be made available to strreaming users, an obligation that did not exist until now.
All this in terms of language quotas. But "incentives" are also planned, such as a 10.5 million euro item to create audiovisual content in co-official languages other than Spanish. "ERC promised that there would be quotas and incentives, and there are quotas and incentives," said Gabriel Rufián this Tuesday at noon in a press conference in Congress, asserting that the party had used its "negotiating strength." However, he stressed that this is a "minimum agreement" and that it will be necessary to continue "supervising" the procedure.
Via Laietana
But it is not the only agreement reached between the Spanish government and ERC. The pro-independence party also demanded, under the Democratic Memory Act, the transfer of the Via Laietana police station to Catalan control. They did not succeed, but they did obtain the cancellation of the budget item for reforms to improve the facilities of the police headquarters building. Gabriel Rufián claimed that this was a temporary first step, because they will continue to fight for its conversion into a space of democratic memory. Also in the area of police and security, the Mossos and rural agents are to be given equivalent early retirement rights to the Basque Ertzaintza and the Spanish National Police - at the age of 60.
Investment and pensions
In the field of infrastructure, ERC and the central executive have agreed to increase investment in Catalonia to 19%, the level required under the third additional provision of the Statute of Catalonia, and as well, that this week, in the framework of the Spain-Catalonia bilateral commission, "the procedures to start the transfer of Catalonia's suburban trains to the government of the Generalitat will begin". Agreements have also been reached on increased transport and housing policy: in the latter case, it is planned to transfer ten million euros to the Generalitat for the purchase of SAREB bank-owned housing and use it for social housing.
And also in the framework of the budget negotiation, the reform of the Spanish government's pension system has been addressed. First, for the first time in history, a public audit of Social Security accounts has been carried out. Secondly, ERC has negotiated an agreement that those pensioners who have contributed for 40 years and are forced to advance their retirement but receive less than 900 euros, will receive a supplement to their pension. Finally, it has also been agreed that it will be stipulated by law that future pension reforms will guarantee the principles of sufficiency, the replacement rate, improvements in minimum pensions and compliance with the European Social Charter.
Last minute deals
With a range of smaller parties using their limited bargaining power to extract concessions in return for helping Pedro Sánchez's minority government to pass its budget, it only remained for the two “priority partners” of the Socialist-UP coalition, ERC and the Basque Nationalists, in addition to Catalonia's PDeCAT, to reach deals with the Moncloa palace. Now only the Basques are missing. Adding all these supports and those of the minority parties, the Spanish government could aspire to 188 votes for its budget, the same as last year.