Sánchez claims his social management in opposition to the Rajoy Government

Adrián Barbón and Pedro Sánchez, during an act of the PSOE in Asturias. Paco Paredes (EFE)

Pedro Sánchez responded this Saturday to the uninterrupted offensive of the right against the Government's management with the forcefulness, and the advantage in political terms, granted by the Official State Gazette. The Executive, which entrusts its destiny in the general elections at the end of 2023 or the beginning of 2024 to the economic recovery after the ravages of the pandemic, will approve an update to pensions for 2022 next Tuesday. A measure endowed with 6,500 million euros , which will favor the almost 10 million retirees in Spain. A very mobilized sector and attentive to the possible loss of purchasing power —as happened to them in 2021— that in Castilla y León, where elections are called for February 13, represents 600,000 voters in a community of 2.4 million inhabitants.“We have to strengthen our Welfare State and dignify pensions. The elderly have suffered with particular cruelty the onslaught of the virus. We have to give them that recognition of dignity,” Sánchez announced at a PSOE rally in Asturias. The average inflation was 3.1%, the highest in 10 years, compared to the rise in pensions of 2.5%, including the

.

Sánchez vindicated himself by recalling in Gijón, in his second act of the week outside Madrid, some of the most controversial decisions of the Government of Mariano Rajoy, such as the 2012 labor reform that only the employer supported, or the hole of 35,000 million left the Asset Management Company from Bank Restructuring (Sareb), the so-called

that would assume the toxic brick of the bank rescue.

The PP assured then that it would not cost a euro to the taxpayers.

"This government demonstrates with deeds, not just with words, its commitment to the Spanish," Sánchez asserted in response to the PP's "denier" attitude.

La Moncloa has designed a strategy that combines the legislative action of the Executive with a search for closeness with which it hopes to respond to the wear and tear of two very hard years due to the multiple crisis (health, economic, social and institutional) caused by the coronavirus. This week's Council of Ministers already prioritized another sector of the population with problems that are very different from those of retirees. The Government approved the rental bonus for young people up to 35 years old, which will benefit tenants of rooms of up to 300 euros, and the State Plan for Access to Housing 2022-2025, of 1,717 million. One and a half million people between the ages of 16 and 34 —equivalent to 15% of this age group— suffer from severe social exclusion after linking the Great Recession of 2008 with the Great Lockdown.

The government sources consulted emphasize that the measures that can be approved will not be recognized at the polls if they are not accompanied by empathy. That would explain the act on housing that Sánchez held on Wednesday in Alicante, in which he expressed his concern about bringing forward the age of emancipation of young people - 85% of those under 30 continue to reside in the family home - and that housing be a "real right" and not a problem for young people. The Government awaits a report from the Judiciary, which is expected to be critical but is not binding, to resume the Housing Law.

The labor reform, agreed with the employers and the unions, was another reason for criticism of the PP, despite the fact that it does not have the necessary support from government allies such as the ERC and the PNV.

“It is evident that it is not the labor reform that the PSOE or the Government alone would have done, nor the employers or the unions.

But that is its virtue: that it is an agreement”, defended Sánchez.

"In the 2010s, we already had enough counter-reforms by the PP without consensus, with general strikes, more social gaps and a breakdown in social dialogue," he stressed, within the pressures that follow one another to convince the Executive's partners.

The nationalists promote the prevalence of regional agreements over state ones.

The CEOE refuses to modify "a single comma" of the reform.

“The PP blocks economic growth”

The President of the Government accused the PP of "blocking growth and job creation" for its criticism of the system for distributing European funds.

The main opposition party has linked them to potential cases of corruption despite the fact that four of the six most benefited communities are governed by Pablo Casado's party.

“Those who questioned the rate of vaccination, that we would reach 70% of the population with the double guideline [in summer] today question European funds.

I ask you, I implore you, not to question European funds because it means questioning whether Spain continues to grow and create jobs like these months”.