If the city were not immersed in the middle of a pandemic, this could well be a political chronicle of December 2019. Same scenario, same protagonists and Budgets still in the air.

The municipal government led by José Luis Martínez-Almeida needs two votes to reach a majority that allows it to develop its economic program in the face of the crisis that the coronavirus has opened in Madrid.

And there, enter the four key councilors that his "priority partner", Vox, has in the Madrid City Council.

Both parties agree that this will be a negotiation "until the last minute", as happened last year when the agreement was not even closed and Vox only abstained in the vote of the Plenary of Cibeles.

The absence of a mayor of Más Madrid, Inés Sabanés, who had not yet been replaced after her jump to Congress, opened the door to the approval of the accounts of Almeida and Begoña Villacís.

But, this year, the pact is going to be necessary

.

"These are important budgets in order to face the economic crisis that occurs," municipal sources tell EL MUNDO that they are convinced that an agreement will finally be sealed.

"

These negotiations always drag on and will take until the last minute,

" they say in Cibeles, where they already have three proposals from the municipal group headed by Javier Ortega Smith on which to start negotiating.

Vox has transferred to the municipal Executive that its claims to approve the accounts are to

comply with the investiture agreement

that it sealed with the PP,

completely eliminate nominative subsidies

and

comply with the agreements of the Plenary

.

"None is an insurmountable proposal, although it will be necessary to negotiate", they point out from the mayor's team, which intends to intensify the talks in the coming days to convene the extraordinary Plenary of Budgets on December 22 or 23.

The investiture agreements and the reduction of direct grants are the two points most on track for the agreement.

In fact, the local government has already winked at Vox in its budget plan for 2021 by modifying all direct aid from the Territorial Coordination Area, dependent on the Vice Mayor's Office, to competitive concurrence.

The department of Villacís, however, insists that this change is based on "a conviction to achieve a more transparent system."

Friction, in plenary agreements

The point of friction between the negotiating parties, at this time, is in the agreements of the Plenary.

"

We have the feeling that we present proposals that we vote in favor so that we remain calm

and then they are kept in a drawer", they indicate to this newspaper from Vox, which demands that these measures go from paper to practice.

In the municipal Executive they assure that these agreements of the Plenary "are studied" and "are applied."

Faced with the tranquility that is perceived in the local government, the radical right group is trying to tension a negotiation that "is far from closed", according to the sources consulted.

"Right now we have the feeling that we are not the preference to agree on the accounts and

we are at the level of the rest of the opposition,

" they affirm, despite the fact that Almeida and the delegate of the Treasury, Engracia Hidalgo, have repeatedly stated in recent weeks that Vox "is the priority partner" due to the investiture agreement that joins the

popular

.

"

We hear many words, but they have not yet sat down to negotiate in depth,

" they say from Ortega Smith's team, where they believe that these meetings will intensify in the coming days once the extraordinary commissions to reel off the 2021 Budgets of each Government Area.

"We are thoroughly studying each game," they warn in the radical right formation, while showing "certain doubts" in some points of the accounts of the Area of ​​Families, Equality and Social Welfare.

"We will ask for all the information," they add.

The way of PSOE and More Madrid

With its eyes set on Vox, the Almeida Executive has tried to open in parallel another way for the approval of the accounts with the groups on the left: PSOE and Más Madrid.

«These are Budgets that endorse the La Villa Agreements that all groups signed.

No one would have to oppose them, "said the mayor in a public intervention last week in which he asked all members of the Cibeles Plenary to" give them a chance "and even abstention from the opposition.

However, the chances that the unanimity that the La Villa Agreements reaped last July, when the 57 councilors that make up the Plenary of Cibeles ratified them, will be repeated at this time are minimal.

The Socialists have already announced that they will present an amendment to the entire municipal accounts because "they are not really transformative or exciting" and in Más Madrid they affirm that the coalition government of PP and Citizens "lacks a city project" and with its Budgets "will only increase the debt and deficit" of the Madrid City Council.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Know more

  • José Luis Martínez-Almeida

  • Coronavirus

  • Covid 19

  • Vox

  • More Madrid

  • PP

  • Begoña Villacís Sánchez

  • Citizens

  • PSOE

  • Madrid

  • Javier Ortega Smith

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