Felipe González to four main party leaders: “Please don't bother standing for election if you can't form a government”

He makes this request 'for their own sake' as well as that of the country, to 'save them the embarrassment' of telling the public 'your vote was not valid the first two times as you gave the wrong answer'.

That, and his frustration with all four for being incapable of forming a cabinet to lead Spain in 300 days.

“If a political force has no chance of forming a government, it should not prevent one being formed otherwise,” González stresses.

“Abstaining [in the in-house presidential voting round] is perfectly reasonable.”

His views contrast sharply with those of the rest of the PSOE, who agreed their leader, Pedro Sánchez, should vote against Rajoy in the investiture ceremony.

“I believe there should not be a third election. How are our political leaders going to do it? Best not to say how I believe it should be done, because that will never happen,” the former president added, cryptically.

“I'm not happy with what's happening at the moment, in general,” González continued.

“[Sánchez] did what he had to do in March [when the PSOE leader formed a deal with Ciudadanos to secure their vote, but lost his own attempt at being voted as president] when Mariano Rajoy turned down the King's nomination to form a government.

“But it's not good enough, in a democracy, to say, 'I'm only asking that they let me govern', as Rajoy keeps saying.”

A contemporary of Margaret Thatcher and John Major, González is considered to be the main driver behind Spain's entry to the EU and the reason for Spain being considered 'the ideas team' and the hot debating non-conformists – something which has been lost since as subsequent governments have shown minimal interest or influence in the Union.

Lauded and criticised in equal measures – as much by socialist voters as opposition supporters – González was the longest-reigning president of post-Franco Spain, having been in office non-stop from 1982 to 1996, when right-wing PP leader José María Aznar took over the reins for the next eight years.

No other president has come close in terms of length of leadership – after Aznar's blaming the Madrid train bombings on ETA despite all evidence pointing to its being Al-Qaeda, socialist José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero earned an outright majority in the 2004 elections.

His social policies won him ongoing support, but Zapatero's big mistake was to refuse to acknowledge the global recession and financial crisis until it was too late, and when he called the election six months early in November 2011, his seven-and-a-half-year reign ended with a landslide for the PP and Mariano Rajoy.

Rajoy's huge majority plummeted to just 123 out of 350 seats in the December 2015 elections, but the PSOE – the PP's main rivals – fared no better with 90 seats, and the inconclusive result led to a second general election in June this year.

Rajoy has failed in his attempt to be invested as president with 180 votes against, no abstentions and 170 votes in favour, of which 32 were gained because of centre-right Ciudadanos imposing six anti-corruption measures and 150 reforms for all areas of public policy on him 'because they did not trust the PP', plus another vote from the Canarian Coalition who said they only did so because 'Spain cannot wait any longer', and the remaining 137 votes being from the PP itself.

Sánchez is reported to have already 'closed the door' on a coalition with left-wing Podemos, although its leader Pablo Iglesias and the party's other regional factions – Ahora Madrid, En Comú Podem (Catalunya) and Compromís (Valencia) are urging Sánchez to reach a deal with them to create a 'government of change'.

And Sánchez has called for Ciudadanos and Podemos to 'not give Rajoy a third chance' – although he has not come up with any alternative plan.