KING Felipe VI's annual Christmas Eve speech once again included a covert appeal to secessionist politicians, as well as raising concerns about young adults' struggle to afford housing and violence against women.
Podemos leads vote of no confidence against Rajoy's government
14/06/2017
Rajoy's government faced a vote of no confidence on Tuesday, tabled by the far-left Podemos party to denounce the long series of corruption scandals that have hit the ruling PP (Popular Party).
The motion is unlikely to succeed as the total 350 deputies in the lower house, PP's 137 deputies will vote against it, as will the 32 deputies from the centre-right party Ciudadanos. The main opposition socialists (PSOE), who have 85 parliamentary seats, plan to abstain in the vote, but the motion has once again shone the spotlight on the PP's badly damaged reputation.
"You have more (party) members under investigation than deputies in the lower and upper houses," levelled Irene Montero for Podemos. "You want to normalise the plundering of public coffers, normalise spending cuts... you want to normalise the deterioration of our health system," she said.
Rajoy listened as she spoke for just over two hours and the PP tweeted "Zzz...," on its official account.
Rajoy then took the stand, thanking Montero for her "kind" words and accusing Podemos of putting on a highly-mediatised "performance."
"I won't deny that there have been corruption cases in the Popular Party like in other parties, some very serious," he said, but..."this scourge won't stop because you table a motion of no confidence," he told Podemos. "It will stop because we approved measures and laws."
Corruption is a major issue in Spain, which last year scored its worst ranking in Transparency International's annual corruption perceptions index. It has mainly hit the PP, but the Socialists and regional politicians have also had their share of scandals.
Such is public anger over the issue that many voters defected to Podemos and Ciudadanos, two relatively new parties, in last year's general elections.
Opinion polls regularly show that after sky-high unemployment, corruption is Spaniards' main concern.
Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias later took the stand and gave concrete examples of people in difficulty in Spain, which is only just emerging from a damaging recession during which the PP implemented sweeping spending cuts.
He said Spain was not reflected in the lifestyle of the deputies in parliament, but rather that it was "the person who looks for work all year long and can only get a job as a waiter in the summer, a young person with a university degree, a masters, a doctorate, with languages, who has had to move to Germany or the USA because their own country doesn't give them an opportunity," or "the police officer without bulletproof vests due to your spending cuts."
This is only the third vote of no confidence to take place in Spain since the 1977 transition to democracy after the death of dictator Francisco Franco, and none have ever succeeded.
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Rajoy's government faced a vote of no confidence on Tuesday, tabled by the far-left Podemos party to denounce the long series of corruption scandals that have hit the ruling PP (Popular Party).
The motion is unlikely to succeed as the total 350 deputies in the lower house, PP's 137 deputies will vote against it, as will the 32 deputies from the centre-right party Ciudadanos. The main opposition socialists (PSOE), who have 85 parliamentary seats, plan to abstain in the vote, but the motion has once again shone the spotlight on the PP's badly damaged reputation.
"You have more (party) members under investigation than deputies in the lower and upper houses," levelled Irene Montero for Podemos. "You want to normalise the plundering of public coffers, normalise spending cuts... you want to normalise the deterioration of our health system," she said.
Rajoy listened as she spoke for just over two hours and the PP tweeted "Zzz...," on its official account.
Rajoy then took the stand, thanking Montero for her "kind" words and accusing Podemos of putting on a highly-mediatised "performance."
"I won't deny that there have been corruption cases in the Popular Party like in other parties, some very serious," he said, but..."this scourge won't stop because you table a motion of no confidence," he told Podemos. "It will stop because we approved measures and laws."
Corruption is a major issue in Spain, which last year scored its worst ranking in Transparency International's annual corruption perceptions index. It has mainly hit the PP, but the Socialists and regional politicians have also had their share of scandals.
Such is public anger over the issue that many voters defected to Podemos and Ciudadanos, two relatively new parties, in last year's general elections.
Opinion polls regularly show that after sky-high unemployment, corruption is Spaniards' main concern.
Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias later took the stand and gave concrete examples of people in difficulty in Spain, which is only just emerging from a damaging recession during which the PP implemented sweeping spending cuts.
He said Spain was not reflected in the lifestyle of the deputies in parliament, but rather that it was "the person who looks for work all year long and can only get a job as a waiter in the summer, a young person with a university degree, a masters, a doctorate, with languages, who has had to move to Germany or the USA because their own country doesn't give them an opportunity," or "the police officer without bulletproof vests due to your spending cuts."
This is only the third vote of no confidence to take place in Spain since the 1977 transition to democracy after the death of dictator Francisco Franco, and none have ever succeeded.
Related Topics
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