The distribution of portfolios in a future Coalition Government between United Podemos and PSOE focuses on Social Security the concern of a part of the Administration and the institutions that warn about the risk of worsening the financial imbalance of public accounts .

The concern focuses on the ideological line of a party that beyond raise pensions does not consider the sustainability of the system and the message that this would move on a crucial element for the credibility of the economic plans of the government. It also weighs the lack of technical profiles and experience for the position within United We may, however, have members with demonstrated capacity in other areas of the ministry such as Migration or Labor Inspection.

If the party led by Pablo Iglesias finishes the negotiations with the Ministry of Labor as a trophy, possibilities are considered that provide the body that pays the pensions of greater autonomy than the one it currently has through a nomination of confidence in the PSOE , explain sources in the Government. Another possibility is to strengthen control over its management from Economy or Finance , which includes no less than 153.8 billion euros, 42% of the State budget and a specific line in the commitments with the European Commission for debt reduction.

With the negotiations to divide the functions in the council of ministers in the maximum stealth, the only clear criterion so far is that the party led by Pablo Iglesias will hold a vice-presidency and up to three ministries of "social character".

Of the candidate portfolios to be occupied by United We Can, Work would be the most executive and budgetary relevance. In addition to directing the relationship with social agents in the face of the announced changes in the labor reform , it manages a single fund for the entire State that is financed through the contributions of more than 19 million affiliated workers. To this backbone, Social Security adds a financial situation that makes it structurally deficient because of the expenses that it must assume to pay a growing number of increasingly high benefits. Currently managed as a secretary of state by Octavio Granado , its debt exceeded 50,000 million euros in October, tripling the 2016 figure.

Although since 2012 Labor has evolved to become a ministry of greater economic than social profile, the strategic importance that the purple party gives to the portfolio now occupied by Magdalena Valerio was already evident last July. Pablo Iglesias himself claimed the management of active employment policies in a last desperate attempt to agree a coalition government with Pedro Sánchez.

Now, the possibility that the new understanding between Sánchez and Iglesias goes beyond these restless terms in circles of the Government, the Administration and certain institutions.

"If it is a short government and the measures they adopt have little budgetary impact in the short term, it will not generate much concern in the markets although the problem will be the inheritance they leave and the deficit in the future, due to the absence of corrective measures," they explain. from a large financial institution. «If the measures increase the short-term and long-term deficit with intensity, the effect on the markets would be more immediate. An example would be to repeal the reforms of 2011 and 2013. This possibility would be negatively assessed by the Commission, IMF and rating agencies as a negative credit event ”, they conclude.

The United Podemos economic program focuses on the one hand, on the general increase in pensions (retirement, widowhood, minimum, non-contributory) and on shielding a guarantee of revaluation of benefits linked to the CPI. It is a recipe against which the Bank of Spain, the Independent Authority for Fiscal Responsibility (AIReF) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), among other institutions, have called for reforms to make the pension system sustainable.

In the opinion of the sources of the Government consulted, the fact that the purple party was precisely the one that last February dynamited the Toledo Pact was not helping when a reform agreement for the next five years was about to take place . Ferrolana precisely Yolanda Diaz, one of the deputies who voted the amendment to the totality of the covenant of pensions is the most cited in the informal football pools as a possible candidate for the post of Labor relevance.

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Know more

  • United We Can
  • Pablo Iglesias
  • IMF
  • Social Security
  • Pedro Sanchez
  • PSOE
  • Magdalena Valerio
  • European Comission

Economic plans The Government of Sánchez & Iglesias: race to raise taxes, labor counter-reform and impossible pensions

Analysis A debate worth a campaign: Five leaders in search of undecided

SOCIAL SECURITY The Government plans to raise pension spending by at least 18,000 million with the 'piggy bank' at minimum