Madrid, Mar 14 (EFE) his demands to ban rubber balls as riot control equipment.
The bitter positions around this point, contemplated in article 23 of the current norm, are those that leave the reform on the edge of the abyss, which needs a simple majority to pass the commission process this Tuesday and be able to reach the plenary session of Congress , where it will need 174 yeses as it is an organic law.
In committee, the reform has secured 18 votes with the yeses of PSOE (13), Unidas Podemos (4) and PNV (1) compared to 17 noes for PP (9), Vox (5), Ciudadanos (1), Junts ( 1) and UPN(1).
Both ERC and EH Bildu have another vote each, and anyone who joins the no side and a tie vote causes the new law proposal to decline.
ERC and Bildu reproach that the reform falls short
A scenario that seems the most probable since ERC has announced this Monday in Barcelona that, if there are no last-minute changes, they will vote against the reform for “falling short” and being “too little ambitious”, by not prohibiting the use of rubber balls, in the words of party spokeswoman Marta Vilalta.
EH Bildu sources point out to EFE that they will not abstain if new steps are not taken to “unblock” the situation, since they consider that the latest amendments presented by PSOE, Unidas Podemos and PNV on the four obstacles that separate the agreement -riot gear, disrespect, disobedience and hot returns – were already rejected last week at a meeting.
“They do not want to limit, prohibit or replace the balls,” a deputy told EFE, who makes it clear that the proposals are “literature” and that the last touches are only “words”, except in the case of offenses for disobedience to the authority.
With regard to rubber balls, on the table of the Interior Commission there is a proposal to incorporate a “reference” to riot control material and in an additional provision include the development of protocols for their use and in which they would participate, in addition to Interior, “civil society organizations”.
A study that the PSOE, UP and PNV propose to carry out in twelve months so that later “specific protocols” are developed that include the use of riot control material and the “assumptions of limitation or prohibition of use of each material”, as well as the mechanisms for the identification of the agents that use it.
The PSOE defends its “enormous generosity”
Socialist sources insist on the “enormous generosity” of the party, which has made an “effort” from its initial position to reach agreements with all groups, but they are also aware that its “concept” of the security forces is “very different” from that of ERC and EH Bildu.
In the PSOE they consider that the agreements reached -36 of the 54 articles have been retouched and almost a dozen additional provisions have been incorporated through some 50 amendments, most of them compromise- represent a “paradigm change” of a law that contemplated a ” excessive protection” of the agents and that, if it goes ahead, it will be a norm that will protect citizens more.
They consider that they have done what is in their power to include all the ERC demands, such as taking into account the opinion of social groups in a future protocol on riot gear, but they censure that they “subordinate everything” to this issue and demand that it be talk about the prohibition of “rubber balls”, when the police means are also tear gas or foam bullets.
Unidas Podemos still trusts the agreement
“The end of the Gag Law is at hand. It would be a drama to endure at least three more years what made it worthy of such a name for not agreeing one hundred percent on these 4 issues”, the spokesman for Unidas Podemos in the reform process, Enrique Santiago, assured on Twitter, who did not he gives up that the opinion finally comes out of the commission.
In addition to expressing their concern about the “absolute refusal” of the PSOE to negotiate these four points with the partners, sources from Podemos denounce the “apparent intention of the PSOE so that the repeal falls.”
The formation led by Ione Belarra understands that the PSOE is aware that, right now, the repeal does not have a parliamentary majority and believes that it has decided to precipitate the commission so that there is no time to negotiate.
If there is no agreement, the Government would face tomorrow, according to Podemos, one of the biggest political failures of the entire legislature.
Starting at 9:30 am, the deputies of the ten groups that make up the Interior Committee will decide whether the reform has come to an end and, therefore, declines, or continues to overcome its pitfalls and is referred to the plenary session.
Each party will first present its position regarding the opinion and then go on to debate the amendments to the lawyers’ report, which, in all probability, will not have any objections, since they are specific technical improvements in the writing.
Below are all the dozens of amendments that have remained “alive” since the start of the process, although many will be suppressed, since they are already incorporated as transactional. Finally, the opinion will be voted on.