Feijóo surrounds himself with Treasury advisers to focus the battle against Sánchez on taxes

The general secretary of the Popular Party, Cuca Gamarra, and the president of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, during the meeting of the National Executive Committee of the PP, this Monday. ISABEL INFANTES (Europa Press)

Almost two months after the congress in which he was elected president of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo has completed the structure of his leadership and of the parliamentary groups in Congress and the Senate.

In the changes, the new economic team stands out, a key group because the head of the conservatives wants the bulk of his strategy to try to reach La Moncloa bascule on the economy.

The team is made up of up to four regional Treasury advisers, a profile that stands out from the rest because the priority is to battle the Government for lower taxes.

Feijóo has selected active leaders in the party with a track record and experience, because he needs figures already shot with only 18 months to go until the general elections.

“This is a

, not a long-distance race”, they say in the leader's team.

In the new structure, in which there are hardly any casadistas, the Galician and Andalusian peso stands out, the lack of gender parity and that Feijóo recovers members of the old popular guard.

Feijóo has entrusted the Minister of Finance of the Junta de Andalucía, Juan Bravo, with the economic deputy secretary of the PP, and next to him will sit in Feijóo's economic team three other regional Ministers and former Ministers of Finance: Galicia, Miguel Corgos;

the one from Murcia, Luis Marín;

and the former Minister of the Balearic Islands, José Vicente Marí.

They are, therefore, specialists in taxes, in budgets and with management experience, because they are governing.

The profile is clear to give battle to the Government with a policy based on tax cuts and cost containment.

Although nobody talks about cuts in the PP, the equation, if taxes are lowered and the deficit is not wanted to increase, can only result in reducing services.

However, Feijóo tries to steal from the left the banner of defending the public sector.

"We are not going to accept that there are other parties that guarantee public services," he said on Monday in his speech before the PP's national executive committee meeting in Genoa.

"The welfare state does not protect whoever compromises its viability," he maintained, after criticizing the excess of Spanish debt.

In Feijóo's new economic team there is a lot of specialist in taxes, but the macroeconomic vision is scarce, they consider popular sources in the economic field.

However, the same sources acknowledge that the group is experienced and very practical, although there are no flashy figures or former ministers.

The team is completed with more regional technicians, such as the Minister of the Environment of Madrid, Paloma Martín;

and former senior officials, such as the former director general of the Ministry of Employment, Javier Thibault, who worked with Fátima Báñez on the 2012 PP labor reform.

Feijóo has dispensed with the ultraliberal Daniel Lacalle, who was Pablo Casado's Secretary of Economy and is known for his catastrophic theses on the evolution of the Spanish economy that have not been fulfilled.

However, sources from the previous stage consider that the PP's speech will be quite continuous, because it continues to be based on lowering taxes and balancing the accounts.

The new Deputy Economic Secretary, Juan Bravo, was already part of the Casado team, as was another of the secretaries, under the orders of the former Environment Minister Elvira Rodríguez, who will now continue to contribute to the group from Congress.

The president of the PP has also completed the structure of Genoa and has reformed the directions of the parliamentary groups of Congress and Senate, which he will preside after becoming a senator by autonomous designation this week.

As the final photo is, the baton of power in the popular leadership is still carried by Galicia and Andalusia, after the pact and the friendship that unites Feijóo with the Andalusian president, Juan Manuel Moreno Bonilla, but Madrid and the two Castillas.

In the parliamentary groups, the same balance of Galician-Andalusian power is observed in the new movements: the leader has placed the Andalusian deputy Carlos Rojas as

of Cuca Gamarra in Congress, and to a Galician, Álvaro Pérez, a close collaborator of his for years at the Xunta de Galicia, as coordinator of the work of the two chambers.

He has also promoted the Galician deputy Jaime de Olano to economic spokesman in the Lower House.

Feijóo's direction is not parity and reduces the presence of women compared to the stage of Casado.

In the hard core there are 12 women for a total of 33 men, 36%;

while in the direction of Casado there were 19 women out of 46, 41%.

Six Casadistas survive in the new dome, although of them Feijóo has kept three very important ones, the parliamentary spokespersons: Cuca Gamarra (who was also promoted to the general secretary), Javier Maroto and Dolors Montserrat, who have been ratified as spokespersons in the Congress, the Senate and the European Parliament, respectively.

Ana Pastor, Ana Vázquez and Juan Bravo also follow.

"Prepared" is the motto with which Feijóo presents himself, and the leader has sought an experienced team because "he does not have time to train leaders," they point out in his environment.

This is also why he has recovered some of the old guard, such as the historic Javier Arenas, who is promoted to deputy spokesman in the Senate, and José Antonio Bermúdez de Castro, deputy spokesman in Congress.

"This party has to prepare to order a possible government in Spain," the popular president warned his supporters on Monday, who acts as if he trusted to have serious chances of reaching La Moncloa sooner rather than later.

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