Pedro Sánchez: "I stand firm. And when there is a problem, I try to resolve it"

Lower House of Parliament, Madrid

In the control session held in the Lower House of Parliament, the president stated that he assumes responsibility for all the government's actions, "both when we get it right, and when we don't get it right. "I stand firm. And when there is a problem, I try to resolve it", he added in his reply to Concepción Gamarra, a member of the Popular Parliamentary Group.

Among the executive's actions, Pedro Sánchez mentioned the moderation of inflation; the deployment of the "social shield" during the pandemic to protect the self-employed, small and medium-sized enterprises and workers; the €45 billion allocated to social policies to alleviate the effects of the war in Ukraine; the 'Iberian solution' to rising gas prices; and the increases in pensions and the Minimum Interprofessional Wage.

"I take responsibility for a feminist government that defends the rights and freedoms of women vis-à-vis your attacks and those of the far right", stated Sánchez, who encouraged the PP to withdraw its appeal in the Constitutional Court against the law on the voluntary termination of pregnancy.

Against intolerance and xenophobia

The President of the Government of Spain, Pedro Sánchez, during the control session in the Lower House of Parliament | Pool Congreso

During the parliamentary control session, the President of the Government of Spain remembered the sacristan Diego Valencia, murdered in Algeciras on 25 January, and the other victims of this "criminal act".

Sánchez has rejected the discourse "of intolerance and xenophobia" launched after the murder. "We cannot add fuel to the fire; we cannot indulge in demagogy; we cannot identify terrorism with any religion or any faith. These are not my words, they are those said at the Episcopal Conference," he said in his reply to Santiago Abascal, a member of the Vox parliamentary group.

The chief executive has also called on this group to reveal who will lead the announced motion of censure.

Progress in the reform of the Citizen Security Law

Regarding the government's police model, a question raised by Gabriel Rufián, a member of the Republican Parliamentary Group, the president pointed out that it guarantees the exercise of rights and freedoms and has state law enforcement forces and agencies at the ready to face the country's threats and challenges.

The President of the Government of Spain, Pedro Sánchez, during the control session in the Lower House of Parliament | Pool Congreso

Pedro Sánchez recalled that one of the commitments of the executive is the reform of the 2015 Law on Citizen Security to eliminate its "most harmful aspects", highlighting the work carried out via the report to modify the points "that ignited the majority rejection of this House and of Spanish society as a whole, and that earned it the label of the 'gag law'". The president pointed out that his government is going to facilitate the parliamentary processing of the reform and that progress has been made on more than 40 of the law's 54 articles.

"We cannot leave the National Police, the Guardia Civil and the Mossos d'Esquadra without an adequate framework of coverage and, in this regard, I am convinced that we are going to continue the current dialogue to make progress on a regulation that I believe can balance the full and free exercise of rights and liberties with the preservation of public order and the security of citizens," he said.

In his reply, the chief executive also stressed that Spain has improved in the democratic quality index published annually by the magazine 'The Economist', which classifies it as a full democracy.

Non official translation