Leaders of the PSOE and the Government, behind the 8-M banner, in the 2020 demonstration.INMA FLORES (EL PAIS)
The first step to face the reform of the most controversial aspects of the law of sexual freedom or the
only yes is yes
, which have allowed more than 721 reductions in sentences for sexual crimes and more than 74 releases, will be overcome in Congress this coming Tuesday with a majority of the most comfortable votes in the legislature, between 285 and 287 yeses, but with a division clear and more than symbolic between the PSOE and its regular partners in this mandate on the eve of 8-M, International Women's Day.
United We Can has already advanced that it will vote against the project retouched and registered by the PSOE, because the theses of the Ministry of Equality of Irene Montero have not been taken into account.
Other allies, such as ERC, EH Bildu or Más País, have advanced that in these conditions of rupture within the government coalition it will be very difficult for them to support this reform.
The PSOE has the publicly expressed support of the entire right, PP, Vox and Ciudadanos,
After several months of private, discreet and difficult discussions between various government departments headed by socialist officials and the Equality Department led by Irene Montero, and also more public and evident discussions and pressure, since the beginning of December, the PSOE reached the conclusion that his reform of some articles of the
law of the only yes is yes
to further narrow the sentences for certain sex offenders would not succeed among the members of the government coalition and would have to prosper with the parties of the parliamentary right.
This evidence was verified a long time ago, before registering the initiative unilaterally on February 6, but that sector of the Executive and the PSOE have taken this time to see if their partners in Unidas Podemos had any possibility of rectifying their most maximalist theses. .
It hasn't happened.
In Equality and Unidas Podemos maintain that the PSOE's retouching proposal returns the penalties for certain sexual crimes to the Penal Code that they label as "of La Manada and the PP".
It is his way of emphasizing that it would mean a "reversal" in the consent of women to certain unwanted sexual relations and in the requirement to demonstrate violence for these behaviors.
The PSOE defends that consent will continue to be at the center of the law, but admits that the range of penalties must be better specified so as not to facilitate some judicial interpretations that with the norm in force since October have allowed the current reductions and releases.
This debate between the two government partners has not advanced at all in the last month.
The PSOE already warned then that if UP did not make its positions more flexible,
I would take out the project with other supports and that is what will happen now, with the first step on Tuesday in the consideration of that initiative by the plenary session of Congress.
The final debate could then stretch until almost the electoral campaign in May.
01:33
Podemos will vote against the 'yes is yes' reform if there is no agreement with the PSOE
The spokesperson for Unidas Podemos, Pablo Echenique, talks with the Minister of Equality, Irene Montero, on February 16 in the Congress of Deputies. Photo: Europa Press |
Video: EPV
Unidas Podemos and Igualdad tried, in the most recent weeks, to force the PSOE into a meeting to agree on some intermediate position, but without ever presenting any of the up to seven alternatives that they say they have sent to their interlocutors.
The PSOE maintains that these proposals were always the same and has not even allowed that appointment.
The vote next Tuesday for the consideration of the PSOE bill is pressing and UP has wanted to put more pressure on the Socialists by advancing this Friday that if that is the proposal that reaches the plenary session they will vote against it.
The parliamentary spokesman for Unidas Podemos, Pablo Echenique, confirmed this in a statement in Congress: "If the time finally comes to vote for a return to the Penal Code of La Manada, we will vote against it, but we don't want that to happen."
And he added: “We have been making proposals for two weeks and asking the PSOE to sit down and negotiate.
We think that the PSOE should bet on an agreement with the feminist majority of the Chamber, with an agreement within the Government with the Ministry of Equality and not rely on the PP”.
Other usual allies of the Executive, such as ERC, EH Bildu or Más País, which have 20 seats, have not yet publicly and formally expressed their vote on Tuesday, but they have been warning for weeks that they will not be in any situation in which it is not counted. with the Ministry of Equality, its head, Irene Montero, and Podemos and yes, on the other hand, with the PP.
And they have now returned to urge the two members of the coalition to agree before Tuesday.
It does not seem that it will be possible to overcome in two days what has been entrenched for months.
"Feminist Commitment"
From Helsinki, at the end of his second European mini-tour, Pedro Sánchez has tried to reduce the tension in the face of the possibility of this divided vote.
"We are talking about taking it into consideration," the President of the Government has minimized, reports
Carlos E. Cué
.
"I think there is a majority feeling that we have to take into consideration the reform of the Penal Code to correct a good law that has had unexpected effects."
"In any case," Sánchez concluded, assuming that the coalition will continue despite this discrepancy, "the government's feminist commitment is total."
The socialist sector of the Government had been informed of the UP position for a few days now, according to Executive sources.
They were counting on it.
They also anticipate that the reform will be highly endorsed in that first filter on Tuesday, and not only by the right.
"The PNV, PDeCAT, the Canary Islands Coalition will support it," says a minister familiar with the negotiations.
PP, Vox and Ciudadanos, who have 154 seats on the right with Foro Asturias and the two former members of Navarra Suma, have already advanced their affirmative vote if it is to correct, as the PSOE also pursues, the so-called "undesired effects" of that law.
The 120 deputies of the PSOE and those of the parties predisposed to promoting these changes now reach 285 votes.
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