The film about the correction of the law of the only yes is yes faces its denouement with more action than suspense. Congress will approve this Thursday by a large majority the reform of the Criminal Code promoted by the PSOE and agreed with the PP -after accepting some of its amendments- and there will once again be the image of a coalition government torn apart by a debate that has already led to the partners to a limit situation in the month of March. This Thursday both face the appointment with the same confrontation but at least the two have tried to redirect their dispute to a lower tone than then. In order not to aggravate the political crisis at the gates of an electoral campaign.
That does not mean that resignation and disappointment are the feelings that are currently invading United We Can and in particular the Minister of Equality, Irene Montero, who will see how the disavowal that the forced reform of the law, imposed by Pedro, is consummated. Sánchez, to calm the “social alarm”. In the opinion of the PSOE, this justifies doing something and that it is seen to react to the almost thousand reductions in sentences for sexual offenders. Although this initiative will in no way prevent these revisions of sentences for crimes that have already been committed from continuing. The change in the Penal Code will only affect the future.
Despite the clash, PSOE and Unidas Podemos exchanged calls and last-minute messages this Wednesday. Words more thought to justify themselves and win the story of public opinion than to seek a final movement. There has been no type of negotiation for months and informal conversations have not come out of the loop. The PSOE has tied and well tied the change with the PP. And with him it is enough to obtain a very large majority. Another thing is that, in front of, in addition to a part of the Government, the PSOE is going to have almost all the investiture partners. Mainly ERC and EH Bildu. Two key parties in the Housing Law.
“We are in time before tomorrow to send a strong message to the Spanish people and, especially, to the Spanish women that feminist rights are not negotiated with the PP,” the Minister for Equality said on Wednesday. She intervened during the government control session, but the main socialist positions in the Executive were no longer present.
Yes, Montero was when the president sent his message to United We Can, also during the control session, when asked by the PP for the only yes is yes. “The best way to defend this law, which is a feminist advance, is precisely to make that technical modification of the Penal Code,” he said.
Sánchez was thus trying to shake off the criticism of Podemos and the escalation of reproaches since it became clear that the socialist move involved agreeing on the reform with the PP. A party that Montero branded this Wednesday as “anti-feminist.” An adjective that Ione Belarra also used to define that this is the first reform with that label that has been carried out in Spain in recent years.
Sánchez will not attend the debate or the vote in Congress this Thursday. He goes to Doñana. The president did not vote for the PSOE text either when it was admitted for processing in the tense session of March 7. At all the milestones of this legal reform it has remained completely on the sidelines. It is an absence that United We Can interpret as significant that the PSOE is uncomfortable.
The one who will finally come is Yolanda Díaz. Since she had been traveling in New York these days, she had requested the telematic vote, so she could have chosen to use it remotely or, instead, to go through Congress, as her team has confirmed that she will do. In March there was a great uproar because neither she nor any of the United Podemos ministers supported Montero in the debate on the admission of the socialist proposal. Only Belarra was with her, accompanying her on her mourning day. The second vice president appeared in the chamber for the vote. That day they had a tense talk in one of the corners of the Congress from which both came out with a face of circumstances.
The bulk of the reform of the law of the only yes is yes has to do with how violence and intimidation are treated in the Penal Code in sexual assaults. The socialist text places them as decisive to distinguish between the highest penalties and the lowest penalties. Instead, Equality held that the way to treat violence and bullying was as “aggravating circumstances” so that consent was the key factor. For the socialists this will continue to be so, while for Podemos consent will no longer be at the center.
Sources from United We Can describe this Thursday’s vote as “serious” and, although they understand that the PSOE sees the wear and tear due to the political crisis amortized, they give the utmost importance to what is going to happen. Because despite the fact that everything has already been played out at the political level, the important thing is how the law will be drafted.
These sources believe that there is a part of the PSOE that considers that it can benefit from appearing before public opinion as a party that is capable of agreeing beyond the investiture majority. In any case, they interpret that above all there are electoral reasons. An accusation that the PP verbalized this Wednesday: that the PSOE has moved out of “fear” and “opportunism” before the bleeding of votes.
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