Sumar will not give up the special tax on large energy companies and aspires to continue negotiating it until the end, even though he reached an agreement with the Socialist Party on a broad tax package that does not include this tax . The plurinational group left an amendment in place and hopes that pressure from the rest of the left-wing parties in Congress will succeed in moving its government partner. ERC and EH Bildu have already forced Monday to postpone the vote in the Finance Commission to prolong the negotiations and Podemos warned on Tuesday that it would not support the reform if this tax was removed.
The PSOE thus finds itself in the middle of a dilemma which divides the investiture bloc into ideological blocs and underlines that the majority resulting from the 23J can be used to advance democratic measures but not so much those which have to do with the redistribution of power. LEFT. On the one hand, the PNV and Junts negotiated with the Ministry of Finance a tax reform which leaves out the most left-wing partners. This is why Sumar recognizes that this negotiation is “demonized”.
“We didn’t give up. We maintain our amendments in force and we will try to have them approved until the end and we will continue to fight,” said Sumar’s deputy spokesperson, Txema Guijarro, during a press conference in Congress on Tuesday. . Sumar reached an agreement with the PSOE this Monday, shortly before the Finance Commission held which sought to give its opinion on the bill which aims to increase the minimum corporate tax rate for multinationals to 15% and which the government wants to transform into a broader tax system. pack.
In this set of measures, Sumar agreed with the socialists, among other things, to maintain the special tax on banks, create a new tax on luxury and increase by two points the income tax of individuals on capital income above 300,000 euros, among other measures. But the pact, which requires the multi-national group to vote in favor of the bill when it reaches plenary, leaves out the tax on electricity companies. All this because the socialists have already committed, especially to Junts and also to the PNV, to withdraw it. Both parties are under strong pressure from employers in their territories to cancel this tax.
Guijarro criticized the Treasury’s decision to begin negotiations with them before the left-wing parties. “We like to start building majorities on the left. We believe this is the best way to ensure that enough votes are reached and progressive policies are adopted. From there, if I had been in the ministry, I would have started differently, not with Junts and the PNV,” he said.
These previous agreements concluded with the nationalists make it very difficult to support ERC, EH Bildu but also Podemos. So much so that this Monday, while the Republicans warned that they would reject the decision, the PSOE decided to postpone the planned debate in the Finance Commission. The deadlines that the Socialists respected were aimed at obtaining a decision on Monday and having the law approved this Thursday in plenary. With yesterday’s decision, the Commission will meet again on Thursday and the law will fall in plenary this Monday, pending the next steps.
Podemos will not support a reform that “cuts progress”
As on other occasions during this legislature, Podemos is determined to call on its four deputies in Congress, essential to carry out any initiative. “We consider that it is possible to carry out a reform that does not involve reducing the progress of the previous legislature,” said Podemos spokesperson in Congress, Javier Sánchez Serna, on Tuesday, referring to this tax on electricity companies promoted by the previous PSOE government and United We Can.
However, if the text does not provide for the removal of this tax, says Ione Belarra’s party, it will not support it. The group complains that the government did not even contact them to negotiate and that they learned of the agreement between Sumar and the socialists through the press.
“We hope to be able to negotiate that progress can be included, but without setbacks, in a new zero-sum game that, I think, leads nowhere, it is about moving the ball in a cup,” explained Sánchez Serna .
“Sometimes the lesser evil is the direct path to a greater evil. We led an important fight last season saying energy companies needed to take greater social responsibility. It seems to us that there is no excuse, given what we are seeing, for energy companies not to contribute and take greater responsibility,” he added.
