The PP of Mazón limits the powers of Vox to control sensitive areas and the bulk of the accounts

SPAIN / By Carmen Gomaro

Amendment to the whole. After eight years of left-wing policies in the Valencian Community, the agreement reached yesterday between PP and Vox for what will be their government program points to a radical turn in the direction of the Generalitat. The future Valencian Government will have the popular Carlos Mazón as president, while the bullfighter Vicente Barrera will be the vice president for Vox with the Culture portfolio. Not only that, because Santiago Abascal's party, which had already obtained the Presidency of the Cortes, will manage two other ministries, that of Agriculture and that of Justice and the Interior. And, above all, Vox manages to get the PP to assume its discursive framework.

It is the price that the popular pay to guarantee a “stable and strong” Executive, whose roadmap expressly mentions “domestic violence” but says nothing about the macho violence, despite the fact that the PP conditioned the pact to the fact that the Vox candidate convicted of mistreatment, Carlos Flores, did not enter the Consell. Anti-squatter office, pseudo parental pin or repeal of historical memory laws are some of the many that Vox points to, which also deletes any reference to climate change. If his electoral program was summarized in 12 points -compared to the 2,000 of the PP-, the 12 appear reflected in one way or another in the list of 50 measures that will guide the action of the Consell.

Now, this is on paper, because the reality is that the PP has not relinquished control of the main ministries and the most sensitive areas, which has generated not a few frictions during the negotiations, according to the sources consulted.. For example, equality or gender violence policies will remain in practice under the popular wing, as well as those for the environment and the fight against climate change or those related to families.

The PP, therefore, will assume the direction of all social portfolios, including Health, Social Welfare and Education. In the latter, in addition, there is the competence of language policy, a high-voltage matter taking into account that Vox had never before entered the government of an autonomous community with a co-official language.. In this sense, the document even speaks of the “free choice of the teaching language”, that is, Spanish or Valencian.

And, unlike what is happening now, the Environment will be separated from the Ministry of Agriculture, so that it will not be the responsibility of Vox, which also loses everything related to water policy, whose defense Mazón wants to capitalize on.. But the PP also reserves another key issue, such as the always complex negotiation with officials. Public Function will therefore be separated from Justice.

In addition to keeping all the social portfolios, which account for the bulk of the Generalitat's budget, the PP will also manage the economic ones. Treasury, Infrastructures and Employment will be for the PP. In other words, direct dialogue with social agents, employers and unions is also reserved.. By the way, the regional employers' association CEV reacted yesterday to this first package of measures by applauding the fiscal ones, which contemplate the abolition of inheritance and gift and heritage taxes, as well as the repeal of the tourist tax.

The objective of the PP, as they insist from the Mazón environment, has been to somehow limit Vox's capacity for action. In fact, although Justice remains under the orbit of Vox, Mazón already rushed yesterday to promise on Onda Cero the “recovery of gender violence courts” which, according to the PP, Ximo Puig eliminated with the plan to group judicial parties.

What is completely unknown is what Barrera will do at the head of Culture, which in these years has paradoxically been in the hands of Compromís and has not had any nod to bullfighting. Not only that, because important institutions such as the IVAM or the Palau de les Arts depend on Culture.

Beyond the discursive line, the document that PP and Vox distributed yesterday includes specific promises such as the approval of a law on identity signs. In reality, it is not a requirement of Vox, but it is the PP who wants to recover one of its latest regulations that the left repealed in 2015. Its objective is to finalize the subsidies to entities “that promote the Catalan countries”.

Nor will there be public aid to associations that “protect” “illegal immigration”. But it is public television À Punt, on Vox's target, which directly appears in the spending reduction chapter. You will be prompted for “plurality” and “concord”. From Genoa, silence is kept for the moment.