The Diplomat
The Government yesterday in the Congress of Deputies cleared the first hurdle to the new Law on International Cooperation with the rejection of the amendment to the totality presented by Vox, but it will have to work during the parliamentary process to achieve the broad consensus it wants, as the PP and the rest of the parties have warned that they will present amendments to improve the text.
The plenary of the Lower House rejected Vox’s amendment by 53 votes in favour and 194 against, according to Europa Press. Santiago Abascal’s party had requested that the text of the future Law on Cooperation for Sustainable Development and Global Solidarity be returned to the Government, denouncing the “ideologisation” of its content and also that national sovereignty was at stake.
Vox spokesperson Víctor Manuel Sánchez del Real, in charge of defending his party’s position before the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, argued that the future law “sells Spain’s sovereignty to global entities that it does not even define” such as “global citizenship” or “global governance”.
He also criticised the 2030 Agenda. “We are dedicated to importing agendas and objectives instead of defending free citizens,” he reproached, denouncing that the government has invented “globalist neo-colonialism” since it intends to “impose a series of ideas” on other countries through cooperation.
“This is not what cooperation is about”, he told the minister, whom he branded a “liar and a liar” and accused of “disrespecting the third political force in the Chamber” and the millions of Spaniards he represents.
In his speech, Albares, who did not mention Vox once when rejecting the amendment, said that they are going “against the tide” and that “they are not opposed to the law, they are opposed to cooperation itself and to the basic principles that inspire” development cooperation, as well as “turning their backs on aid workers”.
The minister defended the fact that the new law, which will replace the 1998 law, is necessary due to the changes that have taken place in the world of cooperation over the last 25 years, and is also demanded by the sector. What is being sought is a “profound and ambitious revision of the cooperation system” that will allow “greater efficiency and impact in our actions”, he said.
The text proposed by the government is “ambitious, complete and defines a new avant-garde model of cooperation”, as well as being the result of “participatory dialogue” both with cooperation actors and in response to the recommendations of international organisations, and also to the proposals that have been made by autonomous communities and local authorities, as well as at parliamentary level, he stressed.
The new law “will make Spain a country of reference within the international community and will position us as a benchmark among models of cooperation”, said Albares, arguing that “for Spaniards to do well at home, we have to do well abroad, and it is also necessary for our neighbours, partners and friends in the world to do well too”. Cooperation is therefore “an investment in the well-being of the world that results in the well-being of Spaniards”, he said.
The minister took advantage of the occasion to outline the main aspects of the text, among them the fact that 0.7% of Gross National Income (GNI) will be set aside by law for Official Development Assistance (ODA) by 2030, and that 10% of this will be earmarked for humanitarian action.
He also recalled that a reform of the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID) is planned, as well as a new Aid Worker’s Statute to succeed the 2006 statute, which will help to dignify this profession. He also highlighted the role of decentralised cooperation carried out by autonomous communities and local councils, “one of our signs of identity and one of the great assets of our system”.
According to Albares, the government’s desire is for the future law to “last over time”, hence its “outstretched hand” to the rest of the groups so that “it can be approved with the greatest possible consensus”. In this sense, he thanked “the vast majority of groups for their excellent willingness to work together constructively to improve this bill”. “This is excellent news for cooperation and for Spain,” he said.
From the PP, its spokesperson, Paloma Gázquez, asked the PSOE for “a willingness to reach an agreement”, recalling that when the previous law was passed, the ‘populares’, then in government, knew how to “give in” and this resulted in a law that has lasted 25 years. “I ask them to do the same,” she said, assuring that for their part they are “in the best predisposition”.
Gázquez said that the text could be “improved” but ruled out the amendment to the whole proposed by Vox. “We are the alternative and a constructive party,” said the PP spokeswoman, adding that they will present partial amendments to improve the text during the report that will now be dealt with in order to improve it.
In the opinion of the spokesman for Ciudadanos, Juan Ignacio López-Bas, the law “could be somewhat more ambitious” but in any case “there is more positive than what is lacking to reject the law outright”. In this sense, he said that they will also present amendments and expressed his confidence that there will not end up being a “transfer of competences” to decentralised cooperation.
In this respect, the spokesperson for the PNV, Josune Gorospe, justified her group’s decision to withdraw the amendment to the totality that they had presented, explaining that there had been “a process of dialogue and negotiation” with the government in the face of what the party considered to be a loss of competences in matters of cooperation for the autonomous communities, and it had been agreed to include safeguards on this issue during the parliamentary debate.