The Third Vice President and Minister for the Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera;
the Minister of the Presidency, Félix Bolaños, and the Minister Spokesperson, Isabel Rodríguez, after the Council of Ministers on August 1, 2022. Jesus Hellin 2022 (Europa Press)
The Government faces another negotiation against the clock to add support.
The Congress plans to debate the validation of the controversial decree of energy saving measures at the end of this month, in an extraordinary plenary session that could take place the week of August 22, according to sources in the Chamber.
By then, La Moncloa will have to have obtained more yeses than noes among the parliamentary groups in order to ratify a text that since its approval in the Council of Ministers —on August 1— has not only encountered the frontal attack of the largest party of the opposition, the PP, but also with the criticism of two of its priority partners.
ERC and PNV accuse the Executive of lack of consensus and communication.
At the moment, and a few weeks before the deadline for validation,
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The president of the United We Can group, Jaume Asens, announced this Thursday that the Government has already started talks with the rest of the political formations to get enough yeses.
Sources from most of the groups consulted speak of specific contacts, but without a specific negotiation.
Others reduce the dialogue to the meeting that the Third Vice President and Minister of Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, held with her spokesperson on July 19, two weeks before the decree was signed.
The Executive has the 153 votes in favor of the deputies of PSOE and United We Can.
From there, some formations are already prone to yes.
Among the leftist forces, the seat of Compromís and the two of Más País are practically guaranteed.
Sources from Errejón's party add, however, that the decree "can be improved."
An extreme in which almost all those polled agree.
From Bildu, with five parliamentarians, they do not confirm what their position will be, but they share "the need to reduce energy consumption", to propose "a new consumption model" and disdain "the absurd criticism" of the right.
The Government could also count on the former Podemos parliamentarian Meri Pita, who usually follows the direction of the vote of her former formation.
Apart from the groupings of the leftist seats, the Regionalist Party of Cantabria (PRC) is in favor of ratifying the decree as a response to the energy emergency and the demands of the European Union.
But the party led by President Miguel Ángel Revilla in Cantabria does not "like many things" in the text, as revealed by José María Mazón, spokesman for the PRC in Congress.
“We have to take measures to save energy.
The problem with the decrees is that they do not admit modification.
It is all or nothing".
The sum of these possible yeses plus those of the PSOE and United We Can would give a result of 163, still insufficient for validation before the parliamentary arch of 349 seats.
Moncloa has to request the convocation of the extraordinary plenary session for the validation of the decree, which has to be ratified in a month after its approval.
The adjusted numbers could vary the forecasts of the Congress, which place its celebration in the week of August 22.
In the same plenary session, two more decrees will be approved, the one that regulates the self-employed contribution system and the one on urgent measures regarding forest fires.
The Government will have to launch all its parliamentary negotiating machinery to bring positions closer to the ERC and PNV, who have not yet decided what the direction of their vote will be.
The nationalist formations do not hide, however, their anger at the actions of the coalition in processing the decree.
The Republicans, led by Rufián in Congress, disgrace the Council of Ministers for having "acted too quickly" and without counting on the social actors involved.
“We found the measures insufficient”, complain from ERC, whose leaders will meet soon to discuss what their position will be in the extraordinary plenary session.
With the 13 deputies of Esquerra, and if the previous supports were fulfilled, the Government would already obtain the majority.
The PNV's offensive has been much tougher since the text with the restrictions was made public.
The anger of the Basque formation is blunt.
At the sectoral conference that Minister Ribera held on Monday with the communities, the Basque Minister for Economic Development, Sustainability and the Environment, Arantxa Tapia, called for "flexibility" in the application of the decree.
And from the parliamentary group, made up of six seats, the central government is accused of having left them aside in drafting the restrictions.
“There has been no conversation.
And that we have an investiture pact”, they criticize.
Sources from the party in the Lower House warn that the weight of the negotiation, in this case, will depend largely on how the dialogue between La Moncloa and the Basque Government is resolved,
On the opposite side are the forces of the right, whose efforts this month have focused on discrediting Sánchez, whom the PP accuses of "energy rationing."
The Popular Party prefers not to advance his position, but from his public and private statements it can be guessed that the formation of Núñez Feijóo, which has 86 deputies in Congress, will remain at no.
Sources from the Popular Party insist on demanding that the President of the Government withdraw the decree already in force "imposed without dialogue" and replace it with a new one.
The Minister of Tourism, Commerce and Industry, Reyes Maroto, disdained this Friday the frontal opposition of the PP in an interview on Antena 3. "We have to be up to the challenge that Europe is setting for us," she sentenced.
The far-right formation Vox, with 52 seats, also flatly rejects energy saving measures.
Citizens, critical of Sánchez's "improvisation and last-minute lurches", will determine in the coming days the direction of the vote of its nine deputies.
“The Royal Decree proposes blackouts and does not provide alternatives.
Its measures affect 10% of energy consumption and it only affects merchants”, the Cs parliamentarian Guillermo Díaz censored this Friday in an interview on TVE.
The former Citizens deputy, Pablo Cambronero, will vote against from the mixed group.
Other parties have not yet determined how they will guide their vote.
This is the case of PDeCAT —which did give its approval to the labor reform decree—, Foro de Asturias and Coalición Canaria.
"We don't like the forms, or the lack of dialogue with the economic sectors or with the political forces," add sources from the Canarian party.
The formation also expresses its discomfort at "the grievance with the Canary Islands when establishing free commuter trains for the Peninsula and the Balearic Islands", a measure that is also included in the decree.
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