The Diplomat
The Second Vice-President of the Government and Minister of Employment, Yolanda Díaz, yesterday described the audience granted to her by Pope Francis at the Vatican as “very moving”.
The audience lasted about fifty minutes, including greetings to the team accompanying the Vice-President, who told journalists afterwards that the meeting had been “very moving”, and that she had to be respectful, so she could not reveal “the content of the conversation with the Holy Father”.
Government sources, however, added that in the conversation they discussed the legislative decrees that Spain has undertaken to alleviate the crisis and the concept of work as a social agent that gives dignity and brings equality, without specifically mentioning the labour reform.
Later, on her Twitter account Yolanda Díaz wrote. “Today I met with the Pope in the Vatican to discuss decent work, the crisis of covid-19 and the future of the planet. Building a world with more solidarity and justice is only possible with dialogue between different people for the common good. There is hope. He added: “In the face of inequality and precariousness, the best vaccine is fraternity and social justice”.
As is customary, the Vatican press office did not issue a press release on the audience, in which the Second Vice-President gave the Pope a special edition of the book of poetry by the Galician writer Rosalía de Castro, Folhas novas, and a stole made of recycled plastic made from polymers from plastic waste, embroidered by the convent of the Discalced Carmelite Nuns of Alcalá de Henares. Both gifts embody both the ecological vision of the world and the defence of migrants that the Pope and Díaz share, according to Spanish government sources.
Yolanda Díaz, a Communist party militant who has embarked on a campaign to promote an alternative to the left of the PSOE, is the second member of the coalition government to be received by Pope Francis. On 24 October 2020, he already held a meeting with the President of the Executive, Pedro Sánchez, who went to the Vatican with his wife, Begoña Gómez.
The audience with the Second Vice-President comes a few days after it became known that the Spanish Government has asked the Vatican for its approval to appoint the former Minister of Education and former spokesperson of the Executive, Isabel Celaá, as ambassador to the Holy See.
