08/07/2011
Esperanza Aguirre: “The first and nearly the sole measure to set the current State of Autonomies back in track is restoring the constitutional consensus. Or, at least, restoring the consensus between the two major parties, the Socialist and ours. If that consensus is not restored, the more or less frantic race of transferring state capacities to Autonomous Communities will continue, we will continue modifying regional Charters which will increasingly resemble small State Constitutions, and national politics will became serfs of Communities. In fact, many times already Spain looks like the eighteenth Autonomous Community”
“The current situation of economic crisis demands from all politicians and from all political parties to extreme our sense of responsibility”
“If it is always said that crises are the best opportunity to change what doesn’t work, I believe it is time for us all to work with responsibility, forget our personal interests and think about the common project that Spain represents with the generosity and far-reaching vision held by the men of the Transition”
“We have arrived at the current State of Autonomies inadvertently. When a formula was sought to integrate Catalan and Basque nationalists nobody would have guessed that the regions of Spain would end up having a parliament, a structure that resembles a State with its ministries called consejerías in this case, with its courts, its advisory councils, its ombudsmen, etc., etc. and etc.”
“We can assert that Spain is today a country that in fact works as a federal state but as it isn’t one constitutionally speaking, it has all the disadvantages of federal States but lacks all the advantages of federalism”
Luisa Fernanda Rudi: “With regard to title VIII, the constitutional pact was based on three vectors: a broad political and not only administrative autonomy; solidarity, a word that is excessively used in current times but that is very badly applied; and the most important, constitutional loyalty which, ever since Zapatero stepped into office, is worryingly absent”
“Once title VIII of the Constitution was passed, what seemed clear was that we understood that as the final point of arrival of the autonomic model, while for nationalists, it was the departure point”
“The turning point of Zapatero’s lack of responsibility took place in 2004, when he announced that he would support the charter reform that the Catalonian parliament devised”
“The decentralisation race started by nationalists was followed by other Autonomous Communities devoid of nationalist governments. Nationalists have played the hare, but the truth is that many other Autonomous Communities have played the greyhound”
“The excessive autonomic regulation, which hasn’t always proved to be necessary, has not made citizens’ life easier and has helped to break the Spanish single market, exceedingly complicating economic recovery. Because if Spain fares badly, not a single Autonomous Community will fare well; on the contrary, if Autonomous Communities fare well, the nation as a whole will also fare well”.