Congress rejects the Friendship Treaty with France due to the “no” vote of the PP and the abstentions of Junts and Podemos

Eduardo González The plenary session of the Congress rejected the Friendship and Cooperation Treaty between Spain and France this Wednesday due to the votes against it by the People's Party (PP), which insisted on the need for the Constitutional Court to rule on the text before any approval, and the abstentions of Junts and Podemos. The text received 163 votes in favor, 171 against, and eleven abstentions. The abstentions of Junts and Podemos were decisive, allowing the PP, Vox, and UPN bloc to win jointly. On May 6, the Congressional Foreign Affairs Committee approved its opinion on the Treaty after the PP chose to abstain rather than vote against it, pending the Constitutional Court's ruling on the text. However, on this occasion, it chose to vote against it. The Treaty can only be ratified when it has the support of both chambers, but whatever happens in the Cortes Generales (Spanish Parliament), the future of this text will depend on the decision of the Constitutional Court, which has already warned that any decision will depend on its ruling. The "Treaty of Barcelona," signed on January 19, 2023, in the Catalan capital by the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, and the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, within the framework of the 27th Spanish-French Bilateral Summit, is the first of its kind between the two countries and elevates bilateral relations to the highest possible level, comparable to that already enjoyed by Spain and Portugal since the Trujillo Summit in October 2021. France has already ratified the text, but Spain has not yet been able to take that step, precisely because of doubts about its constitutionality. At the end of January of this year, the Council of Ministers agreed to submit the text to the Cortes Generales as an emergency measure and authorized Spain to express its consent to be bound by the aforementioned treaty. However, just a week later, the PP filed a constitutional appeal against the Treaty, arguing that one of its articles, which stipulates that "a member of the Government of one of the Parties shall be invited to the Council of Ministers of the other Party, at least once every three months and in rotation," is incompatible with the Constitution. On February 12, the Senate plenary approved the constitutional appeal against the Treaty, with the favorable votes of the PP (which holds an absolute majority in the Upper House), UPN, and Vox, and the dissenting votes of the PSOE and the rest of its usual parliamentary partners. Likewise, the Constitutional Court accepted the request made by the Lower House in March. Contrary to the PP's arguments, the Socialist Group asserted that the Constitution does not expressly prohibit the presence of non-government members in the Council of Ministers and recalled that the presence of foreign representatives at government meetings in other European countries is not uncommon, and that Pedro Sánchez himself has even attended German government meetings. The debate During the plenary debate, Pepe Mercadal of the PSOE (Spanish Socialist Workers' Party) stated that this is "a very good and necessary agreement that all of us who believe that states should work together to find common solutions to common problems should believe in." "The coordination mechanisms between the governments of Spain and France that this Treaty creates will be useful spaces regardless of who governs," he asserted. "For Spain, strengthening cooperation with France is positive: it is positive for our own interests, for example, to better defend our common interests in the Council of the European Union," he added. "Therefore, I do not understand how it is possible that the People’s Party in the Senate decided to challenge this Treaty before the Constitutional Court," he continued. "Ladies and gentlemen of the PP, it seems to me that you acted on the strength of a headline. I don't think everyone in the PP agrees with that decision," stated Mercadal, who asserted that, with his position on the Treaty, "the PP's foreign policy seems more like Vox's foreign policy." For his part, Ricardo Tarno Blanco, of the PP, criticized "the PSOE and the government's stubbornness" in bringing the agreement to the House "without the Constitutional Court guaranteeing the legality of said agreement." "We are waiting for the Constitutional Court to rule, and we don't understand the rush, when this is an agreement that was signed in January 2023, more than 27 months ago," he stated. "Two or three more months wouldn't have posed any problem," he warned. "You are trying to make us transfer the same botched jobs you constantly make in Spanish legislation to international legislation and international conventions," Tarno proclaimed. "It's incomprehensible, because, tomorrow or the day after, the Constitutional Court could declare the agreement null and void," he insisted. According to the PP MP, this is "a treaty that is clearly very important because it deepens relations between two friendly countries" and, therefore, "it would be an intolerable mistake if the treaty could not be implemented due to the incompetence of the Socialist government of Mr. Sánchez and Mr. Albares."

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