JxSí, CUP roll out embryo of future Catalan social protection law

BarcelonaIn a week marked by disagreement between Junts pel Sí and the CUP over the budget, the two groups set aside the controversy on Tuesday to jointly unveil a draft bill to create an agency for social protection in Catalonia. This is the "shell" of one of the three bills expected to lead to the break with Spain —a model for social security of an eventual Catalan Republic— and it stems from the breakaway declaration of November 9.

Mireia Vehí, CUP representative, stressed that it is an agency of an "regional" nature, which in no case violates the existing legality -- even though it comes from the 9-N resolution that in its day was contested by Spain’s Constitutional Court (TC) -- but is nonetheless "essential for the breakaway" from Spain.

Vehí added that it is necessary to be "brave" when creating a comprehensive public welfare law on which the future model of social protection for an eventual Catalan state will be built. The creation of the agency has been tabled in a rush so as to get it approved during this parliamentary session and the law can be passed some time before the end of 2016.

This all-embracing agency will bring together the Generalitat´s current responsibilities for social welfare, along with any new ones acquired as the secession process advances. Chakir El Homrani, representative for Junts pel Sí, noted that this agency will be subject to parliamentary control and will participate in the government. In addition, he assured that the fact that it is being presented now has nothing to do with the need to show unity with a governmental partner in the midst of the budget controversy, but instead responds to the fact that this just happens to coincide with the resolution of the last details to create the agency.

Vehí remarked that this body will be made up of people who are already working in the area of social policy, and as such will not "duplicate jobs" nor represent an "excess expenditure”.

Ciudadanos warns that the process "is doomed to failure”

Minutes after Junts pel Sí presented the bill, the spokesman for Ciudadanos in Parliament, Carlos Carrizosa, predicted that the new regulation´s days are numbered, because it involves developing the breakaway resolution that was suspended by the TC.

"The process is doomed to failure", he warned, and lamented that "the social rights of Catalans cannot be guaranteed through a legal confrontation with the State". The spokesman for C´s asked how this law improves the lives of Catalans, and criticized that no attempt has been made to resolve the situation by using the powers that the Generalitat already has.