A lawyer and economist who defines himself as “catholic and liberal” will be the president of the Balearic Parliament. At the age of 45, Gabriel Le Senne has been elected with 34 of the 59 votes of the Balearic Chamber in its first plenary session, the constituent session after the May 28 elections.

Le Senne has been boosted with the votes of PP (26 seats) and Vox (8), which ensure an absolute majority in the chamber.

The already president of the Parliament of the Balearic Islands is a lawyer and economist, specialized in commercial and civil law. He is also a liberal Catholic and columnist, until now legal deputy secretary of Vox Baleares. Active on social networks, after the Valencia pact he criticized the “tacticism of the PP”, saying that this “makes it unvotable”. In his personal newspaper library there are also messages against abortion, against the notion of gender or calling to block “advertisers with LGTBI flags”.

Thus, the first step is fulfilled to materialize the agreement between both right-wing formations so that the 'popular' Margalida Prohens is sworn in as president next week. The agreement, reached on Monday night, involves not only the transfer of the parliamentary presidency to Vox but also a written agreement that commits to comply with a package of political axes.

Prohens thus wants to ensure a solo government. For this, he seeks the abstention of Vox in the investiture plenary session that will be held next week.

Although officially no one in the PP anticipates that the government will be alone (not even Feijóo himself, who yesterday said that he was not one hundred percent insured), the reality is that the agreement reached with Vox and the transfer of the regional presidency paves the path for that government without Vox. Unlike Valencia, the PP does not want a coalition Executive in the Balearic Islands. The two concessions sealed between Monday and Tuesday thus strengthen it, in the absence of materializing in the coming days.

Despite the concessions, the PP has reserved a position of strength in Parliament. Thus, by virtue of the agreement signed with Vox, the formation of Prohens is left with two vice-presidencies of the Chamber.

Turn in the trial for the Alvia train accident in which in July 2013 80 people died and 144 were injured. This Tuesday, after the declaration phase of the criminal and civil proceedings concluded, the documentary and conclusions process began and the prosecutor, Mario Piñeiro, announced that he is withdrawing the accusation against the former director of Traffic Safety at Adif, Andrés Cortabitarte, accused for 80 crimes of homicide and 145 injuries due to serious professional negligence and one for damages.

The Prosecutor's Office, with this decision, only maintains its accusation against the driver of the Alvia, Francisco José Garzón Amo, tried for the same crimes and for whom, until now, the Public Ministry requested the same sentence. The train driver is also asked for special disqualification from the profession of railway engineer for the time of the sentence, disqualification that in the case of Cortabitarte was for the exercise of any profession that implies management, security or responsibility in railway infrastructures.

In his initial letter, Mario Piñeiro maintained that the tragic accident would not have happened if Adif and the Traffic Safety department at that time “had evaluated and managed the risk of speeding” in the section of the accident, but this Tuesday they agreed remove that allusion.

He initially maintained that Cortabitarte “infringed the duty he held due to his status within Adif, as the head of said management, which had the duty to manage and mitigate the risks of speeding not covered by the protection system of the line itself. and the train”. However, it now concludes that “he did not infringe the duty he held as head of the service and acted in accordance with the procedures included in the management system approved by the national security authority.”

Regarding the driver, he maintains that he was traveling at 199 km/h in a section close to the vicinity of a dangerous curve, that of A Grandeira, when he answered a call to the corporate mobile phone, which does not have a hands-free system, made by the intervener, speaking for 100 seconds. In responding, “he omitted the minimum attention to his professional duties” and at that time he broke “the minimum rules of attention and professionals that are required of him”. When he finally did react, he managed to reduce the speed to 179.38 km/h, but it was insufficient to prevent the train from derailing.

The lawyer of the Platform of Victims of Alvia 04155, which represents the majority of those affected, Manuel Alonso, has maintained his accusation and his four-year request for both defendants after a “quite favorable” trial for the interests of the victims, since the test “has been much stronger than in the investigation phase” and everything is “corroborated”.

Final phase of the trial

The trial entered its final phase on Tuesday after going through the courtroom in the Cidade da Cultura de Galicia 522 witnesses, 21 witnesses/experts and 126 experts; and the 446 injured people who claim for this accident registered almost a decade ago on the outskirts of Santiago de Compostela, on the A Grandeira curve in the Angrois neighborhood. Now, it will be the turn of the reports from the parties, which will last until July 27, three days after the tenth anniversary of the incident.

The session was special and, for the first time since last October 6, the two defendants met in the courtroom. The driver had not returned since the day he testified as a defendant, while Cortabitarte did return to the trial during some technical sessions in the first weeks of the oral hearing.

In the process of this Tuesday, the presence of both was mandatory, as well as of all the parties in person, so that a hearing room was filled again, which in recent months has been practically empty. In this case there are 154 accusations assisted by 110 lawyers and all attended without fail.

To support his fellow driver, several dozen train drivers also gathered at the gates of the trial.. The spokesman for the train drivers' union (Semaf), Diego Martín, explained that they were seeking to “clothe” Garzón, with whom “they feel identified” and has assured that “we are not going to stop accompanying him in this final stage”.

Victims criticize a “political” decision

The prosecutor's decision caused “outrage” among the victims of the accident. Its president, Jesús Domínguez, maintains that “there has been nothing in the oral trial to justify it, quite the contrary”, since all the independent experts and Christopher Carr, former head of security for the European Railway Agency, “made it clear that It was necessary to carry out a risk analysis and that, if it had been done, this danger would have been avoided”.

In fact, they consider that, after the trial, “the responsibility of Cortabitarte has been further entrenched”. In fact, the lawyer for the platform has maintained the same accusation against him and against the driver, but has requested greater disqualification for the former position of Adif, which they raise to six years..

For Domínguez, the “only explanation” for this change in position is “political”, that the State Attorney General, Álvaro García Ortiz, has given orders to the prosecutor in the case to “free the administration”, which shows that Mario Piñeiro “he is a good servant and follows orders”. Regarding the political implication of this case, they recall that the former socialist minister José Blanco “hurried” for the inauguration, so that the line was opened “without risk analysis” that would justify the decision to withdraw the security system. ERTMS' of the last kilometers of the route that did appear in the initial project.

The demographic crisis and the change in the typology of jobs due to digitization are forcing the university to change its structure. In the next three decades, the percentage of people between the ages of 18 and 29 will drop by 20% due to the drop in the birth rate. Now, 95% of university students are that age. Less than 5% of undergraduate students and less than 20% of master's students at face-to-face public universities are over 30 years old. The EU objective is that, by 2030, 60% of the population between the ages of 25 and 64 have had some type of training experience. That means adults will have to go back to the classroom, albeit virtual, and get out their notebooks and pens whether they want to find a job or keep it.

The new formations, yes, will be flexible and shorter than a degree, far from the “rigid” structure of the degree and postgraduate, as explained yesterday by the Minister of Universities, Joan Subirats, during the presentation in Malaga of the Action Plan for the Development of University Microcredentials in Spain:

What are they?

Micro-credentials are something like mini-degrees that are awarded after short courses of a minimum of one credit and a maximum of 25. That is, between one week and four months of training. Many are in digital or hybrid format and are aimed at students who, according to Subirats, “has been little present in Spanish universities”. «This is the population between 25 and 64 years old, regardless of whether they meet the requirements to enter the university. They are people who did not enter in their day because they went to work and now they opt for these courses, “said the minister.. In other words, universities will admit students even without a baccalaureate degree.. “They will be able to be accredited for their professional career,” explained Subirats, who stressed that the underlying idea is “to open the university to all ages.”

'Upskilling' and 'reskilling'

The EU has asked Spain to reinforce its training strategy throughout life, the so-called longlife learning. Before, what a person studied at the university was useful for their whole life, but the structural changes in jobs, and the uncertainty regarding which ones will be needed in the coming years, are causing “deficiencies in certain training courses”, in the words of Subirats. This issue is one of the best things about the new Organic Law of the University System (Losu), approved last March and still pending development.

The microcredentials will be used for upskilling (teaching a worker new skills to improve their performance) and for reskilling (training a professional to adapt to a new position).. They can be stacked and accumulated, in such a way that the student can get a higher degree accreditation, equivalent to a university degree or a master's degree, without having to go to the current university entrance exams for people over 35, 40 or 45 years.

with companies

One of the characteristics of micro-credentials is that they are courses “in sectors and strategic activities in which there is a shortage of qualified personnel or professional retraining needs”. Subirats has designed his plan counting on the rectors, but also with the employers, the chambers of commerce and the Economic and Social Council (CES), something that is not usual since in the public university the company has traditionally been viewed with suspicion. According to Subirats, “it is essential that this co-production process between the universities and representatives of the company take place, that they respond to social demands, not only to the offer made by the university.”

“We have to do it not thinking about what universities can offer, but thinking about what society needs,” stressed Eva Alcón, president of the Conference of Rectors of Spanish Universities (Crue) and rector of the Jaume I University of Castellón. .

60,000 students

The micro-credentials plan proposes 41 actions. The first of these is the creation of a “seed capital” of 50 million euros from European funds that will be distributed at the end of the summer among the autonomous communities. To establish the amounts, the number of people between 25 and 64 years of age has been taken into account.. The regional governments will give that money to public universities so that, between January 1, 2024 and June 30, 2026, they develop pilot plans for micro-credentials.. The “minimum commitment” is that this money will serve to train 60,000 people in these two years and generate 1,000 training courses.

Regularize to ''without papers'

New scholarships will also be created for the unemployed or people in social vulnerability. The plan sets an example for refugees. According to Subirats, micro-credentials “can be used for people to legalize their situation in Spain.”

In this sense, the Minister of Inclusion, José Luis Escrivá, issued some instructions a few days ago that develop the new figure of roots by training, by which immigrants in an irregular situation who have been in Spain for two years may have a residence permit through through these courses. A minimum of hours is no longer required (initially 200 were requested) and they do not have to be face-to-face, to favor women with small dependent children. This training can be completed through micro-credentials and allows you to live in Spain on a regular basis for at least 12 months, extendable if the training lasts longer or not everything is approved within this period.

“They are an instrument to prevent a part of the population from finding it difficult to understand and keep up with technological change,” stresses the Ministry.

The teachers

The Government plans to create a digital platform that serves as a one-stop shop where all university micro-credentials can be consulted and allows access to enrollment “immediately”. In addition, university professors will have to be “retrained” to provide them with the tools to train adults and professionals with work experience.

The 30 words that make up point 43 of the agreement between the Popular Party and Vox in the Valencian Community, and that limit the defense of equality to “domestic violence”, have unleashed a struggle between both parties that already splashes their national relationship, the negotiations that they maintain in other territories and even the pre-campaign of the general elections just over a month before the polls open.

Violence against women and the terminology that defines it -gender or sexist violence according to the PP; Domestic violence according to Vox- is currently the main stumbling block between the two main right-wing parties, which after sealing more than 150 local alliances last Saturday -some in important provincial capitals- are now immersed in at least three important territorial negotiations in Extremadura, the Balearic Islands and Murcia.

To the already entrenched differences of each enclave, it is now time to add a new element: the battery of measures presented by Vox to unify its criteria regarding violence against women. A catalog with which Vox seeks to stop the smear campaign that it claims to suffer after denying its number two for Valencia the existence of sexist or gender violence and that it now exhibits before the PP – which elevates the issue to “priority” with a view already set in La Moncloa – as a legislative model that deserves to be, at least, studied before reaching an agreement with Vox.

Vox leader Santiago Abascal. m. Chiofalo EUROPE PRESS

It is a decalogue that synthesizes a good part of Vox's claims in terms of Equality since its foundation: it proposes to “support and assist victims of domestic violence, especially that suffered by women, children and the elderly”, identify to all rapists released by the yes is yes law or to prohibit the entry of “no man, regardless of the gender with which he perceives himself”, in spaces reserved for women, such as changing rooms or toilets. It also proposes tougher penalties for rapists, lowering the criminal age and including permanent imprisonment for cases of rape, in addition to guaranteeing that “no assaulted woman will be less accompanied or assisted based on the sex of the aggressor or aggressor or the gender with which self-perceived.”

“Defense of Women”

“The PP will have to say if they like it,” sources from the party's leadership express about the package of measures, which they presume is the most severe in legislative matters in defense of women and which proves that, unlike what defends the left and a part of the PP, Vox's commitment to Equality is intact. In fact, the party's position was established yesterday by Santiago Abascal: without denying the existence of the phenomenon, Vox does not accept or share the “ideological concept” of talking about gender or sexist violence.

But these words convince little or nothing in Genoa, where last Friday the alert was activated for this issue and it continues to sound despite the nuance. Is the PP willing to study Vox's proposal to reach a midpoint, either in the territories under negotiation, or in a hypothetical government? The voices consulted deny the greatest: «We already have a model. We're not going to change it.”

The tone of Alberto Núñez Feijóo with which he referred to the matter yesterday revealed that the PP does not intend to lower the bar again with Vox in terms of Equality as in the Valencian Community. The leader of the PP promises to make the “fight for equality and against gender violence” a “priority” and, in a transversal manner, shoots at both sides -the left and those who “call themselves to be on the right”- in defense of their equality plan: «We will not make a law like the yes is yes nor are we going to deny or stop fighting against a scourge that leaves fifty women murdered every year at the hands of their partners».

EH Bildu already established as his first slogan of the electoral campaign of the generals that the PNV is an ally of the PP of Alberto Núñez Feijóo. The general coordinator of the Abertzale coalition yesterday blamed Ortuzar's party for “campaigning” the leader of the Popular Party by accepting his votes to prevent pro-independence mayors from taking over the municipalities of Vitoria, Durango and Gernika. Otegi, satisfied for having increased the institutional power of the nationalist left in the Basque Country and Navarra, tried to reduce the conflict in Bermeo where the mayor of his formation resigned after having a drunken accident and his local partners now demand that he hold that mayor's office.

EH Bildu assumes that the PNV has agreed behind the scenes on the votes that last Saturday ensured the votes of the PP of Alberto Núñez Feijóo in the three aforementioned consistories. An argument that will be repeated in the coming weeks before the appointment at the polls on 23-J because the votes of the Basque Popular Party will also be essential for the PNV to make Eider Mendoza deputy general of Guipúzcoa against the pro-independence Maddalen Iriarte.

Otegi confirmed a “Holy Alliance” in which already during the campaign he included the PNV with the Basque PSOE and the PP and that now adds Vox. The nationalist leader blamed Basque nationalists and socialists for “buying the marks from the right, from the extreme right and runs the electoral campaign for them.”

EH Bildu saw how last Saturday symbolic city councils in the Basque Country and in Navarra, in which he had grown electorally and who he intended to govern, appointed mayors of the PNV and the Basque PSOE with the support of the PP. The popular Basques achieved in a discreet negotiating process that Daniel García was appointed mayor of Labastida in a tense plenary session in which the three nationalist councilors confessed that they were “disgusted” by how their party had acted to, immediately afterwards, announce that they were leaving the PNV.

EH Bildu intends to consolidate at the general polls the political “earthquake” produced by the results of the municipal and local elections in which the PNV was penalized for high abstention. A threat to the Ortuzar and Urkullu tandem who are already looking towards the final examination of the regional elections in 2024.

Before, EH Bildu will have to solve the unexpected problem that arose in Bermeo after Asier Larrauri, appointed mayor of EH Bildu last Saturday, suffered an accident at dawn tripling the permitted alcohol rate. Larrauri resigned from his position and with his abandonment he has caused a crisis in the Mayor's Office of the Biscayne municipality. The Guzan neighborhood platform wants the new mayor to be Xabier Ortuzar and not the second member of the EH Bildu list in the town. Bildu and Guzan had signed an agreement with which they displaced the PNV – winner at the polls – from the Mayor's Office but, without an agreement, they could lose Bermeo in a sour electoral hangover.

The Catalan independence movement intends to make electorally profitable the painful defeat that Xavier Trias reaped last Saturday, when he lost the Mayor of Barcelona at the hands of Jaume Collboni thanks to the support of the PP for the socialist candidate.

The secessionist forces appeal to avenge the constitutionalist operation that prevented a front formed by Junts and ERC from governing the second city of Spain and that both the Council and the Generalitat were dominated by parties contrary to the constitutional order.

Once the disgust has been digested, Junts and ERC intend to resume negotiations to form that common front that Pere Aragonès proposed after the municipal ones with an eye on the general ones. Once an electoral alliance to run in a coalition has been ruled out, they continue to consider the possibility of going to 23-J with a programmatic agreement to defend the same position in Congress once the elections have passed, something that has not happened in the current legislature, in the that ERC has opted for the negotiation with the PSOE and Junts has continued focused on the confrontation.

Feeding this spirit of pretended communion, Gabriel Rufián called the secessionist mobilization: «I ask for the vote for independence, I don't care if it is for ERC. Let them go vote,” said the head of the Republican list for the generals yesterday.

The second movement of ERC went through placing Ernest Maragall as number two on the Senate lists, with the aim of using the other victim of the constitutional pact in the Barcelona City Council as an electoral claim.

“I am running to respond to the State pact against Barcelona and to give voters the opportunity to correct what the State has prevented, what the PP, the PSOE and Sumar have decided to spoil,” said Maragall yesterday, who was going to become in the first deputy mayor of the Barcelona City Council by virtue of the agreement reached with Trias, which came to be validated by the bases of ERC and Junts. «We must go from the veto to the vote. The State has applied a de facto 155 in our city and for this we have to go to Madrid with the maximum force and power. We cannot accept that what happened on Saturday is expressed through resignation,” Maragall added, to try to reactivate the Republican electorate, who opted to abstain in the municipal elections, which led Oriol Junqueras's party to lose 302,000 votes. .

Trias, for his part, preferred to promote the boycott of the constitutionalist forces in Catalonia for having allied themselves against his candidacy for mayor. “I ask people not to vote for them. Voting for the PP and socialist in Catalonia is a disaster,” he claimed, before offering to actively participate in the Junts campaign for the generals, although he ruled out symbolically joining the lists.

The nationalist continued to defend that there is a will to “exterminate” the independence movement to seek the reaction of his voters. Junts calls to vote “so that Spain does not win”. “You have to vote to say no to this Spain that did what it did in Barcelona,” defended the head of the neoconvergent list, Míriam Nogueras. “If we don't go out to vote, Spain will win, if you don't go, they add up,” insisted the candidate chosen by Carles Puigdemont.

Yolanda Díaz has forced a profound renewal of Sumar's electoral lists, in which two out of three deputies with real options to be elected are new. There are only 11 candidates who were part of the United We Can group that emerged from the 2019 elections. The others would be released if a result similar to that of then was achieved.

In many cases, these are changes that are determined by the alliance policy. The new parties integrated into Sumar have proposed candidates from their formations, for whom a gap had to be made. However, there is also a very important part of this revolution that bears the stamp of Díaz, who has undertaken a policy of signing profiles of civil society to prop up the idea that Sumar is a “citizen movement” and not a “soup”. of Acronyms” on the left.

The Madrid list is the best example of that spirit of renewal that, at the same time, means cornering Podemos and relegating it to play a “modest” role -in the words of Ione Belarra- within the coalition. There are only two people from Unidas Podemos who repeat in the top seven positions. And both, Díaz and Belarra, went for other constituencies in 2019. In other words, there are no faces left from that candidacy.

Now Díaz tops that list. Number two is the Spanish ambassador to the UN, Agustín Santos Maraver; of three, the Saharawi activist Tesh Sidi (Más Madrid); of four, Íñigo Errejón (More Madrid); out of five, Belarra (Podemos); of six, the economist from CCOO, Carlos Martín Urriza; out of seven, the nurse Alda Recas (Más Madrid).

From there, the possibilities of leaving are extreme. Eighth place goes to Isa Serra, leader of Podemos and adviser in recent times to Irene Montero at the Ministry of Equality. IU does not appear until position nine, with Montserrat García. As an anecdote, José Luis Villacañas, an intellectual referent of errejonismo, appears at the end of the list.

Barcelona's candidacy also suffers a tumble. Aina Vidal debuts as a leader. Only she and Gerardo Pisarello repeat on the list. he, of two. From here Gala Pin, Lilith Verstrynge (Secretary of Podemos Organization and without ties to Catalonia), Eloi Badia and Candela López make their debut. A classic: Ada Colau closes. And a colorful note: before her are the Minister of Universities, Joan Subirats, and Jaume Asens, former number one of the communes.

In Valencia he sends Compromís with Agueda Micó and Alberto Ibáñez as referents. Both new to this ballot. Position three is for IU with Nahuel González. In the lists of the community, the one in Alicante stands out for its great options to leave, where the former deputy of Podemos Txema Guijarro repeats but not as a purple member, but as a Sumar candidate.

In Seville, he also heads Díaz's party with Francisco Sierra, professor of Communication Theory at the University of Seville.. After him, in quota IU, Engracia Rivera. It is in Andalusia where the formation led by Alberto Garzón has more presence. Among them, Enrique Santiago, who is one of the few to repeat and who moves from Madrid to lead the list for Córdoba, and Toni Valero, number one for Málaga.

Sumar provides many candidates. To those already mentioned we must add the labor inspector Verónica Martínez (Pontevedra), the councilor in Santiago Marta Lois (La Coruña), the sociologist and chirigotera Esther Gil (Cádiz), the doctor Rafael Cofiño (Asturias), the writer Violeta Serrano (León) or the former baron of Podemos Lander Martínez (Vizcaya), among others.

In the quota of the partners, the head of the list for Zaragoza stands out, the television Jorge Pueyo, who belongs to the Chunta; and the one from the Balearic Islands, senator Vicenç Vidal, who has been appointed by Ara Més. Special mention for Alberto Rodríguez, leader of the Tenerife list with Drago Canarias. Technically, he is one of the 11 repeat members of the group that came out in 2019 because then he was in Podemos. Then he lost his seat and founded that party.

In addition to Verstrynge, Podemos has its rookies in starting positions: Idoia Villanueva (Navarra), Noemí Santana (Las Palmas) and Guillermo Presa (Álava). Only four deputies repeat: Ione Belarra, Javier Sánchez Serna (Murcia), Martina Velarde (who passes from Córdoba to Granada) and Pilar Garrido (Guipúzcoa).