Jaume The Kingmaker

The maths are simple, give or take a plus or minus here and there. The latest poll suggests that a coalition of the right/centre-right could come into power after the 2019 election. This poll doesn't show any great movement from one last summer. It merely confirms the fact that the only party making a notable gain in the opinion polls is one of those on the loosely defined centre-right - Ciudadanos. It further verifies that PSOE and the Partido Popular are stuck in neutral and that Podemos and Més are in reverse.

If nothing else, the poll reveals that the "new politics" are very much alive. The pattern in the past with PSOE-led governments has been for the PP to come along and trounce them. There's no chance of that happening in 2019, and the PP know it. The party's spokesperson, Marga Prohens, has alluded to the fact that the PP will need a pact in order to form a government.

Unless there is some form of political earthquake between now and May next year, it is clear that there will be a coalition of one form or another. Polls, as we know, are not always accurate, but as the latest shows little movement compared with the previous, it is probably a fair reflection of wider voter sentiment.

A conclusion that the right/centre-right would automatically make an alliance, assuming they together reach the thirty seat majority threshold, is too simplistic. There are issues which bind them and those which do not. El Pi, forecast to increase by one its seats in parliament (from the current three to four), is already being cast in the role of kingmaker. Potentially, El Pi could go either way.

One of the principal differences between the PP, the C's and El Pi is the Catalan question, in particular the language and culture. El Pi was formed in a circuitous fashion. It is the amalgamation of the Convergencia, which was the remnant of the defunct and discredited Unió Mallorquina, and the Lliga Regionalista. This latter party was formed by Jaume Font, now the president of El Pi, after he left the PP. A reason for him having done so was that he was under investigation by a court (the case was later closed). The PP ethics, newly introduced by José Ramón Bauzá, barred election candidacy to anyone being investigated. Font disagreed with this, but he also disagreed with Bauzá's increasingly anti-Catalan stance prior to the 2011 election.

The PP, under new leader Biel Company, have moderated their views. The party has returned to what it once was in the Balearics: accepting of Catalan and also of regionalism. In this regard, the PP aren't distant from El Pi, which also clings to the sort of soft-nationalism that Maria Munar advocated with the UM. There is more of an issue with the C's.

One has to assume that the gains made by the C's (six or seven seats, according to the poll, compared with the current two) owe at least something to the party's stance on Catalonia and to educational matters in the Balearics. The leader of the C's, Xavier Pericay, has been a constant critic of Catalanism in education and of alleged political indoctrination (in favour of Catalan independence and republicanism) in schools. The PP might be prepared to swallow this, but El Pi might not.

For the parties of the government pact, the poll indicates a best-case scenario of them just crossing the finishing line. They would need the one seat of Gent per Formentera (pretty much assured) in order to get to the thirty majority, but this hardly represents a ringing endorsement of the government. Més and Podemos have both slipped, by a combined six seats at most in the poll. Both have their internal issues and both, so it would seem, are being penalised for a radicalism, the counterpoint to which is the rise of the C's.

PSOE, says the poll, might gain one seat and be bumped up to fifteen, but as with the PP, it is a party that finds itself suffering because of the new politics and the past errors. PSOE would be most unlikely to wish to abandon the so-called "progressive" politics enshrined in its agreements with Més and Podemos, but one still feels that it only has these agreements because it has no other choice.

If the pact parties failed to gain a majority, might El Pi be persuaded to ally with them? One can't rule anything out, but it would be hard to see how such an alliance could ever work. To take but one example, there are holiday rentals. El Pi sees things very differently.

As things stand, it is just possible that the election will lead to a minority government. El Pi would be the kingmaker. All the parties need to be nice to Jaume Font.

Taking A Festival To Court

There really are times when you wonder ... . I have a certain admiration for Ciudadanos in a similar way to having an admiration for Podemos. They occupy different political territories, but both are examples of how the status quo of a political system can be shaken up. Yet with both there are elements of the conservative and even the regressive. With Podemos, there is a Luddite tendency that wishes, for example, for "de-growth", an anti-capitalist return to an undefined era stripped of a great deal of the progress through tourism. For the C's, there is one great conservative non-negotiable - Catalonia. This is an essence of its being. Independence is a total non-starter, as is the advance of any Catalan nationalism beyond the borders of Catalonia.

The C's are doing rather well at present. In Catalonia they have secured the most parliamentary seats of any party. They have benefited, in part, from the electoral destruction of the Partido Popular, but more than this, they are solidly representative of the independence counterpoint. They have hung their hat on union, and there are very good numbers of Catalan citizens who agree with them.

Even before the Catalonia election, it was evident that the C's had been making ground in the Balearics. What happens in Catalonia has an impact here, even if this can at times be overstated. But the political atmosphere generated by Catalonia and by statements in favour of a Balearic independence by Més have done the C's no harm at all. Nor have their complaints about indoctrination in local schools.

The exporting of Catalanist nationalism that the C's attack comes in different guises. One of the more peculiar is what is due to take place on 31 December - Palma's Festival of the Standard. This is a fiesta deemed to be in the intangible cultural interest: not just deemed, is. The official nature of this interest was confirmed by the highest authority of making official - a statement on the Official Bulletin. It is there in black and white. In 2006, the Council of Mallorca declared the festival to be an asset of this cultural interest, and with this declaration came certain stipulations as to its maintenance.

The Council of 2006 was different in its political make-up to how it is today. It was still essentially the property of the subsequently disgraced Unió Mallorquina and Maria Antonia Munar. The UM, although ostensibly nationalist in a centrist sort of a way, was never strident in its ambitions, and its nationalism was one founded on its own version of history. Some years before the 2006 declaration, the Council had decided to make 12 September Mallorca Day. This was a recognition of the true founding of the old Kingdom of Mallorca. It was not a date for which there was wholehearted support. There was - in a Catalanist correct fashion - an alternative date: 31 December, the day in 1229 when Catalan culture can be said to have its origins.

Changing the date of Mallorca Day to 31 December was an obvious move. If there were to be a different date, then 31 December had far greater claim than any other. And so, for the first time, this coming New Year's Eve will be Mallorca Day as well as the Festival of the Standard.

For some, such as the C's, this combination was a form of pact between the nationalists of Més at the Council of Mallorca and at Palma town hall. It might not have generated overly much fuss, if it hadn't been for some consequent amendments to the festival protocol. Until now, and despite the 2006 declaration, the festival has been a Palma town hall occasion. In institutional terms, only the town hall has responsibility. Moreover, the declaration made clear that the responsibility for the maintenance of the tradition and guaranteeing the components of the festival was Palma's.

The pact between the Council and the town hall has, in the opinion of the C's, led to a unilateral decision to permit the Council to be represented in the official committee (retinue) for honouring King Jaume I and the Standard. Moreover, mayors from other parts of Mallorca are to be allowed to participate. The C's point to the fact that the 2006 declaration does not contemplate this additional institutional representation. Only the mayor of Palma and city councillors can form the retinue.

Because of this, the C's have taken the matter to court. They are seeking an injunction to prevent the protocol being altered. It is this that makes one wonder. How can a festival end up in court? Does it really matter who is represented in the retinue? It does if there are the politics of Catalan nationalism at play, which is what the C's are really concerned about. But they risk looking somewhat ridiculous and losing some of the admiration. They might disagree with the change to the festival, but going to court over it ... ?

The Week The Past Caught Up - Again

Ciudadanos, the Citizens, is a relatively new political party. It was born in Catalonia eleven years ago. (Oh Catalonia, root of all Spain's malaise.) This new-born political formation was modern, business-oriented, anti-corruption, wedded to Spanish unity, a counterpoint to any thoughts of Catalan secession and also to any Catalan dominance. It still is all of these things. It has proved to be moderately successful in taking its brand of Partido Popular-lite politics (the PP minus the corruption and with less austerity) onto a broader plain. It has modestly conquered Spain. It partially reigns (sic) on the plain, not just Spain's but also Mallorca's. And that's the problem.

Its leader, the one-time swimming champion, the occasional "little twerp" Albert Rivera, discovered last week that he was being compared to José Antonio Primo de Rivera. And who is he? Not is; was. José Antonio was the son of Miguel Primo de Rivera y Orbaneja, the first dictator, the forerunner of you know who. José Antonio was also, and more pertinently, the founder of the Falange. It clearly ran in the blood. For his sins (and there were sins), José Antonio was charged with military rebellion and conspiracy by the still Republican government. He was shot on 20 November, 1936.

Shall I compare thee in a fascist way? Who made the comparison? Was it Podemos? Was it one of the wilder Catalan elements? The Ruffian, Gabriel Rufián of the Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya, perhaps? It was neither. It was the number two in PSOE. Adriana Lastra, Pedro Sánchez's right-hand (left-hand) woman, opined that Rivera had arrived kicking and screaming with his new-born party as a form of Adolfo Suárez reincarnate - Suárez, the godfather of democratic transition. But as the new-born grew, he started his own transition. Into José Antonio Primo de Rivera.

The C's, said Adriana, have moved to the right of the PP, which was a massive condemnation in its own right. The party has "no respect" for the style of autonomous government in Spain, that which filters down to the regions - Catalonia being one of them. Every day, Adriana continued, the C's move more to the right. Was she in fact claiming that the C's are a far-right party? When presented with this question, Adriana realised quite what she had been saying. She withdrew her remarks and apologised. But she had made them nevertheless.

Rivera does have the ability to get under people's skin. He is a sort of Aussie cricketer sledger type of politician, but then so are various others, not least The Ruffian, his left-wing opposite in Catalonia. But the Falange? Really, what was she thinking? Well, she was thinking what all too many think. The latest bout of Catalan soul-searching and navel-gazing has unleashed what is always there just beneath the surface ready to break into the light of day. The past. Spain can't do without it. A national form of self-pity characterises society and not just political society.

There was a time, certainly during Zapatero's period as prime minister, when a new-found maturity appeared to have been attained, a dispensing of the past but also an attempt at the reconciliation that was denied by the amnesia of the post-Franco amnesty. Rivera and the C's were a product of the Zapatero era. Forward-looking. But unfortunately they aren't. They, as with all other parties, are stuck with their historical memories. Puigdemont has merely taken these to an extreme and has in the process facilitated the remembrance of the past. None of them can move forward because they are all victims of this debilitating self-pity.

From a motorway bridge in Barcelona the other day, seven dolls were hanged. Heads down, they bore the logos of the C's, the PP and the Catalan wing of PSOE. The release of political prisoners was the demand that accompanied them. Of course Junqueras and the rest should be released. Wrongs there have been, but incarceration achieves nothing more than fuel the memories of the wrongs of the past. And in the midst of this are the C's, whose modest successes are giving other parties the jitters. Notably those towards the left.

In the Balearics, the membership of the C's has shot up by 20% in the past few weeks. Such a statistic will not have gone unnoticed and has not gone unnoticed by the promoters of nascent Balearic independence - Més, to whom, so the right-wing press regularly insist, can be added the name of Francina Armengol. What fools there can sometimes be on the right in drawing such an assumption.

The C's in the Balearics, and in particular their scholarly leader Xavier Pericay, are on the end of a campaign to discredit them. The main reason for this is the C's insistence that there is political pro-independence indoctrination in Balearic schools. The campaign has been started by the Unió Obrera Balear, in which the one-time hunger-striking teacher from Llucmajor, Jaume Sastre, is a key player. A poster reads: "Who are the new Inquisitors who wish to intimidate and make purges among the teachers of the Balearics?" There are photos of Pericay and Olga Ballester of the C's.

And so, the past goes even further back. From the Falange to the Inquisition.

Working Eight Months A Year

Carlos Herrera is a journalist. He has a large following on a radio show that goes out on COPE, one of the most listened to broadcasters in the country. By way of background, it is of interest to note that COPE started out life as an essentially religious broadcaster. It has become very much more general in its output, though it would appear that it is owned by the church in that the Spanish Episcopal Conference has 50% of the shares of the company to which COPE belongs. Dioceses and religious orders are other shareholders.

This does perhaps need bearing in mind, as it suggests that COPE might not be rabidly left-wing. Its politics and its ownership are, however, of only passing relevance to today's theme, which is one that Carlos has offered. On his show there is a slot, the title of which lends itself to alternative translations but which I shall call "fools' defibrillator". Carlos and co-host pick up on particular stories and offer to defibrillate those who have uttered foolishness or nonsense. And so it was that he held up to ridicule Laura Camargo of Podemos.

The travel magazine and website Preferente highlighted her inclusion on the show last week, noting - and this may or may not have been ironic - that Camargo is the only person in Podemos in the Balearics who has the capacity to think. She may be, but then what she thinks and says ended up being the target for Carlos.

This was specifically to do with her views on workers in the tourism industry who, after eight months' work, are knackered and shouldn't be expected to have to work through winter and therefore all year. In fact, she said this before Christmas, so the story is an old one. On 23 December I drew attention to her remarks, wondering why it should be deemed acceptable for workers to do no more than eight months.

Still, better than late never the Camargo eight-month opinion surfaced on Carlos's show last week and also became the focus of a set-to between Podemos and Ciudadanos (C's). Carlos found it hard to understand, given, for instance, that radio journalists work all year. They are not the only ones. If anyone is interested, I work twelve months a year, usually seven days a week and not untypically up to eleven or twelve hours a day. Am I knackered? All the time.

Ah but, this is just sitting down and typing, is it not? Generally, yes. But there is being physically knackered and there is being mentally knackered. Neither state is particularly ideal, but suffice it to say that I tended to agree with Carlos's observation.

Camargo came out with this eight-month business in the broader context of tourism policy. We don't want more tourists in the winter, she said, and used the knackered workers as a reason why not. What of course she was really getting at was that we (Podemos) don't want more tourists, full stop. In fact, we'd prefer that there were fewer of them. Camargo and Podemos are highly suspicious of government attempts to erode seasonality and therefore make the tourism season ever longer. The workers, it can seem (and probably are), something of a smokescreen.

Which is not to deny that there are workers in the tourism industry who put in long hours, day after day over a several-month period with few breaks (if at all) and don't get particularly well paid. Camargo has a point, especially when it comes to exploitation, but only up to a point. Politically, she is very much on the side of the workers and has made her feelings about hoteliers well enough known, and the politics were partly where Carlos Herrera was coming from, as most certainly also was the leader of the C's, Albert Rivera. He tweeted the other day that Camargo is a deputy with a party which proposes gifts of income paid for by the state.

Rivera's tweet brought differing responses. Some accused him of demagoguery. Others took issue with the Podemos view of work and supported him. In the latter camp was a tweet which read: "Some consider work to be a punishment and being on the dole a fiesta."

In addition to stirring up the political ill-feeling between Podemos and the C's (not that it needs much stirring), the Camargo remarks served not only as a statement about her party's views on tourism but also to reignite the whole issue of the unbalanced nature of work and employment.

She was essentially saying that the situation which has been created because of seasonality is as it should be. Tourism is not the only industry affected by seasonality, but there are others which are not. Would she advocate everyone working no more than eight months a year? Police, nurses, firemen just to take three examples. Defibrillate away, Carlos.

An Agreement For Prominence

It was the Sunday of the last big summer weekend. Everyone should have been at the beach or preparing to head home. Mariano Rajoy and Albert Rivera were not. They watched as the parliamentary spokespeople for their parties - the Partido Popular and Ciudadanos (C's) - put pen to paper and signed an agreement under which Rajoy is assured of the support of the 32 C's deputies in Congress for the investiture votes this week. It was a curious ritual. Neither leader had wanted to give his signature.

Maybe neither wanted to bind himself to anything long-term. The agreement is short-term as it is. If Rajoy fails to gain the support of 176 deputies in either of the two votes (one tomorrow, the other on Friday), the agreement will be ripped up. Albert Rivera will be free to come to an accord with someone else. He's making a habit of this. He had one with PSOE's Pedro Sánchez until Sánchez failed so drastically with the two investiture votes in March.

Added to the PP's 137 deputies, the 32 C's deputies give a total of 169, to which one more can be added - the vote of Ana Oramas of the Coalición Canaria. She had given Sánchez her backing in March. Like Rivera she has switched sides. Where will the remaining six come from? Anywhere? If they do not, it looks like a Christmas Day election.

Rummaging around among other regional parties might produce something. The conservative nationalists in Catalonia and the Basque Country have thirteen seats between them. While there wouldn't be formal support for Rajoy, could there be abstentions? Given Rajoy and the PP's attitudes towards Catalonia in particular, it might seem odd that this could even be a possibility. But the C's Inés Arrimadas was aware enough of it to have warned Rajoy last week that the C's could withdraw their support if there were nationalists' abstentions "in exchange for something".

Rajoy was talking to Sánchez yesterday, trying to convince him to get PSOE deputies to at least abstain. The painful truth for PSOE is that whichever way it goes, it cannot win. To be seen to be allowing Rajoy in would bring accusations of the "casta" at work - the two-party system of the PP and PSOE, so despised by Podemos (and once upon a time by the C's). Sánchez would receive nothing in return. His party could lose a lot if he did. President Armengol in the Balearics will have been reminding him of this; Podemos have been making warning noises about the Balearic pact of government if PSOE enables a Rajoy investiture.

None of the four main parties, with the possible exception of the PP, can afford to have a third election. PSOE lost seats in June, so did the C's. Podemos in effect stayed as they were, regardless of the alliance with the United Left. Who's to say that the PP wouldn't add to the fourteen seats it gained in June? A third election might just make it even more inevitable that the PP will finally carry on, though the C's cannot guarantee losing more than the eight seats they did in June.

The left, unless there were to be an unexpected rebound by PSOE and a leap for Podemos (also unlikely), would not be able to form a government, just as they were unable to after the December and June elections. Rajoy and the PP are, in truth, the only game in town. Sánchez may as well select six sacrificial names at random and get them to say sí rather than no.

If Rajoy were able to somehow drum up the 176 votes, what would it mean for Rivera and for the C's? The point to be made is that the agreement does not mean that there would be a coalition; it is only one to facilitate the investiture. It is possible that there might be a coalition, though this seems unlikely. Rajoy and Rivera don't like each other; the chemistry would be all wrong.

The PP would therefore form a minority government, with policies determined by the agreement. The C's have pressed for and obtained acceptance in respect of, for example, social policies, but Rivera has not got all that he wanted regarding anti-corruption measures: both the C's and Podemos have these at the heart of their respective agendas.

For Rivera, the agreement is designed to show the electorate that the C's are the only party capable of and willing to negotiate with both the left and the right. It might also demonstrate they are a party of vacillators; Rivera will prefer the positive spin. And he badly needs to get that across. The slump in the C's vote in June made it imperative that the party was not sidelined and so might undergo a decline as rapid as its rise. Prominence, more than anything, is what Rivera gets.

The Imploding Socialists: Spain's election

There's an election on Sunday. If it seems as if it's only yesterday since the last election, that's because it was: well, six months ago anyway. But elections come around so often, you can be forgiven for losing track: Spain appears to nowadays operate on the basis of regular election rather than actual government.

So, what has happened in the intervening months? Not a lot. There was of course the farcical failure to arrive at any accord between the parties that would have allowed someone to be permanent prime minister rather than an acting one. Other than that, however, little has changed. Podemos have acquired a new best friend in the form of the United Left and appear destined to take number two spot in the electors' affections. Otherwise, things are more or less as they were. Chaotic.

Will they be any different after Sunday? No. The chaos will remain but it may be diluted somewhat. That will be if PSOE and Pedro Sánchez decide to let the PP and Mariano Rajoy officially continue. The chances are that this would be as a minority government rather than as a coalition, but who knows for sure? Sánchez doesn't, and he may well be out of the equation anyway. PSOE barons are sharpening their knives, unimpressed by the failure to make any headway in the polls.

But Sánchez is a bit like an England football manager. It makes little or no difference who's in charge. Getting anywhere is bound to end in failure. This wasn't once the case with PSOE, but it has never recovered from having been the party that presided over the start of the economic crisis.

Going into the election, everything is so familiar. What was said before the December election still holds true. There are four main parties, two of whom have disrupted the two-party system and another two who too few people like or trust. The PP and PSOE behemoths have been reduced by the dual thrusts of crisis and corruption, to which can be added some all-round nastiness by the PP as well as the A-word: austerity.

But that, you might think, has shifted somewhat. Isn't Spain all the better economically now? Better even than it was six months ago? Maybe, but there are too many voters who are seeing nothing of the recovery and too many who have come to despise the PP for austerity and have thus been seduced by the promised land of Podemos or by the mini-me PP of Ciudadanos.

That isn't wholly accurate of course. The C's are a shiny, bright vehicle compared with the rusting heap that the PP is contriving to just about keep on the road. The C's are also all for the "citizens" - they couldn't be anything else, given that their name means that - and so against corruption. They have some bright young stars, such as their leader, Albert Rivera. Yet somehow they seem to have got stuck. Contrast them with Podemos, who keep managing to move forward: there are some clever bastards in the Podemos ranks, and they have even managed to disguise the disagreements that exist in those ranks.

Alas for Podemos, Pablo Iglesias will not emerge as prime minister. Or it would take a seismic event for him to become so. Perhaps the defenestration of Sánchez might be it. He surely won't survive this second election and another farcical failure to become premier, but would a successor look upon Podemos with any more positive light? Very doubtful. PSOE have been totally humiliated and continue to be. The ultimate humiliation would be to serve in a government under Iglesias. It won't happen.

Closer to home, i.e. Mallorca and the Balearics, there is further humiliation to come. Francina Armengol, head of an unstable government for all that she insists that it is the opposite, must know that the fates are conspiring against her. PSOE in the Balearics seem destined to come third, just as PSOE nationally will. Podemos will become the major force in the "pact". There will be a reappraisal and an even more vicious one if Sánchez allows Rajoy to stop acting and start being premier again.

So what will happen to Francina? Possibly nothing. It may well suit Podemos to carry on with how things are. They can happily continue to dictate policy: even more so, if the election goes the way it is expected to. Francina would therefore seek to assure the "citizens" that there is "normality" and "stability". Though she might not believe it, others in PSOE do. For all her brave talk, it is PSOE that Podemos have been attacking all along, wishing to destroy wishy-washy socialism with the real thing. Podemos can bide their time, believing that Sánchez support for the PP will lead PSOE to completely implode.

Boy And Girl Bands: Podemos and friends

The brotherhood, sisterhood and infanthood descended on Palma en masse during the week. There they all were, Podemos, Més and friends, as though they were about to engage in a benefit gig for the regional electoral amalgamation of You-Nits-Podemés. It was the head mikes that did it of course, making the collective appear as though it were a boy/girl band about to break out with a chorus of Take That's "Everything Changes". In truth, only the Infant Errejón (who was replete with cool, One-D-style, Harry Styles shades but no ponytail) can pass as a member of a boy band. Some, such as Here Come Da Judge, most definitely cannot. As has been remarked previously, Da Judge bears more than a passing resemblance to Jim Bowen in his "Bullseye" heyday, and Jim was certainly not one for indulging in frivolities like being a member of a boy band: "Super, smashing, great."

They all appeared before a banner declaring "The Smile of the Mediterranean". Perhaps they were in fact a Beach Boys trib. What would they sing from the "Smile" album? "Heroes And Villains"? And who would be the villains? Were you watching, Mariano? Alas no. Instead we got, and inter alia, Pablo Iglesias (the sort of Brian Wilson of the band) informing the citizens that "democracy is incompatible with hotel lobbyists who determine political power, some of them having accounts in Panama". Who on Earth could he have possibly been referring to?

The Infant called for there to be an "intergenerational pact", which wasn't quite as alarming as it sounded; it was a pact of votes from different generations, and if anyone was capable of referring to intergenerations, then it was the Infant.

Throughout all of this, there was no mention by Pablo of PSOE. Not that they would have been on the stage anyway, given that You-Nits-Podemés are going to relegate them to the bronze medal on 26 June. And it was well that they weren't. Imagine if Palma's Smiler had been there: mayor Hila who can smile from parts believed unimaginable by mere mortals.

This all took place on Thursday, three days after the Great Debate on Spanish telly. This was notable for the fact that each of the four prime ministerial (presidential) candidates wore a white shirt, the key differences having been that Pablo sported neither tie nor jacket, while Al Rivera of the C's had the whistle on but no Peckham (as in Peckham Rye - tie, if it needs explaining).

The absence of Al's neckwear was presumably designed as a further means of distinguishing him from his double-act partner, Pedro Sánchez of PSOE. True to form, this Ant and Dec duo were arranged with Ant to the left, so that the audience could figure out which one was which.

Amidst all the grimacing and stony looks of the Great Debate - accusations of corruption, all the normal carry-on - there was a spot of smiling too. Mariano doesn't really do smiling. Or not convincingly. His smiling on this occasion was the befuddled grin of a dad back from the pub who comes in to find junior (which one would that be?) entertaining his two chums with the latest Metallica album. When Mazza wasn't trying his hardest to smile, he was letting it be known, among other things, that Ant (Pedro) would be a "dreadful president (prime minister)". Not, it is becoming clearer, that Ant will ever be either.

The (Spanish) Governmental Ménage à Trois

So, as the big day looms ever closer and the fateful votes will be cast - and I'm talking not of 23-J but of 26-J - the bookies (were there such a thing) are reporting good money going on a threesome forming the next government. Yes, after one failed election and an even greater failure by Pedro Sánchez to oust Super Mariano, 26-J looks destined to unite Pedro and Mazza. Possibly.

Pedro and Albert, Ant and Dec of PSOE and the C's, are still determined to continue their unconvincing double act and make it even less convincing by inviting Mazza into the political celebrity jungle. Or maybe it's the other way round. Or maybe Super Mariano won't be there at all. That's something else the bookies are laying odds on. Which is hardly surprising. Through all the faffing around after last December's election, it was clear to everyone, except Mariano, that if only he had stepped aside, the grand coalition could have been formed.

As we know, however, Mariano doesn't believe that he has a natural successor. Super Mariano would rule forever if he had his way. But the time is now coming when he will have to give way to an unnatural successor. Who might it be? The bookies are reckoning on the Dancing Queen, María Soraya Sáenz de Santamaría Antón Etc.

None of this will of course go down well with the advocates of governments of change and progressive politics. How would either Ant or Dec be able to spin a cosying up to the PP as representing change or progression? Only if Mariano goes, but even then they would be barely credible. For Ant, meantime, the possibility exists that if PSOE gets a further stuffing, he might no longer be around in any event. I'm a failed politician, get me out of here.

The likelihood of this coalition ménage à trois stems not from any genuine belief among the three parties that it is what any of them wants but from Pedro's fear (or the fear of any successor to him) that he could well find himself forced into being a number two behind Pablo. Podemos have been talking up Iglesias as being the next president, and it most certainly would be president. None of this Anglicised prime minister lark. Pablo, a prime minister serving a Bourbon king? You have to be joking. President it would be.

There is a further reason to believe that there will be this three-in-a-bed liaison. The citizens. They won't accept any more arsing around. They won't want a December election to sort out the mess of 26-J. Something will have to give. And Super Mariano is what will have to give. He can't be like Arsène Wenger, arsing around forever and ever ... .

The Never-Ending Election

The people of Spain will go to the polls again on 26 June. This date hadn't just been written in the stars. It had been written in the press right from the time that Mariano Rajoy told David Cameron there would be an election three days after the referendum. It had in fact been written as long ago as 20 December. When the results of the general election became known, there was already momentum gathering towards a second election: a momentum born out of the singular inability of the political parties to generate their own momentum towards creating accords of sufficient viability to form a government.

Spain is in uncharted territory, cast adrift in a sea of confusion and disruption. It is proving impossible to reconcile the ambitions and achievements of the two usurpers of political power - Podemos and Ciudadanos - with the baggage and histories of PSOE and the Partido Popular. It is further impossible to reconcile the competing ideologies of these two usurpers. Like unexpected challengers for a Premier League title, they battle it out to see which one emerges the stronger and assumes the crown of victors over the old guard. They both play pressing games at high tempo, pressing their claims with a constant barrage of new political thought but doing so according to competing systems. Podemos is all-out attack on institutions and the wealth of the old guard; Ciudadanos is defensive, minded to not let loose either the institutions of state (such as national unity with Catalonia) or the wealth of the capitalist state.

Where does Spain go from here? Quite possibly to a further election. The June election, if the opinion polls prove accurate, will supply only slight shifts from the pre-Christmas election. The PP might gain a little, Podemos might gain, the C's might push forward. PSOE may well stay where they were or drop back, the dominant alternative to the PP but without dominance: lame and torn between the past and the future. Pedro Sánchez, for all his words, would still rather he didn't need to sit with Podemos around a government table. He blames both Pablo Iglesias and Mariano Rajoy for the impasse. In truth, they are all to blame: ideologies cannot be reconciled. Yet there is the prospect of Podemos and the United Left forming a pact that might result in it being the premier force of the left above PSOE. But let it not be overlooked that there are tensions within Podemos that could undermine such a pact.

Come 26 June and the time to decide, and the outcome will provide a sense of déjà vu. There will be meetings, negotiations, offers and counter-offers, just as there have been since Sánchez failed - to no one's surprise - to garner sufficient support for his investiture in March. But to what end? For Sánchez to accede to Podemos demands would be a capitulation. He has so wedded himself to the pact with Albert Rivera and the C's that making room for Iglesias is pretty much an inherent impossibility. He cannot turn to Rajoy. An accord with the PP would likewise represent a capitulation. His humiliation would be complete. If he remains.

So predictable has the June election become that parties have already been in discussions as to how they will present themselves. The left in the Balearics is edging towards a pact that might see Podemos allying itself with Més and the United and Republican Left. The PP has "ordered" the regional leadership (temporary) to maintain the list of candidates it had in December. Mateo Isern will be number one again, and he will once more end up as a Congress deputy.

Meanwhile, the uncertainties and the inability of Sánchez to arrive at an agreement with Iglesias - a last-minute proposal from the Valencia left-wing Compromis party was met with the sound of the Podemos door being slammed - are causing deep concerns in Palma. President Armengol has been insisting that her government, with Podemos the onlooking determiners of policy, is stable. It now looks less so.

Moreover, if there were still to be no new government of the left after 26 June, then the Balearics would find itself further out on a limb, unable to press for changes that had been hoped for. One of the principal reasons why Biel Barceló and Més finally accepted a pact with Armengol was an understanding on financing from national government, one that Sánchez would deliver. He is no nearer being able to guarantee this than he was on 20 December.

Though the regional government was obviously formed on the basis of the regional and not the national election, a strong, combined showing by Més and Podemos on 26 June would weaken Armengol. Her position may become untenable.

Stability, for all that it is trumpeted, has been lost. Whatever happens on 26 June, the instability will be greater. Uncharted territory indeed.

Panto Season In Spain

"He's behind you!" "Oh no he isn't!" "Oh yes he is!" It's panto season in Spain. We know this because one of the great dames has decreed it thus. Mariano Rajoy has said there's a panto. Oh yes there is. It was a peculiar observation by Mazza. The Spanish, as with most of the rest of the non-British world, doesn't get panto. For the Spanish it's doubly confusing. Why would you actively seek out audience participation? Ah, you see, times they are a-changing and even Mazza has got the citizen participation bug. Which part of the pantomime horse should he be? The question needs to be posted on to the Official Bulletin. At present, Mazza is firmly in the rear. But who knows? The pantomime is such that he could become the front and double up as Widow Twankey.

Mariano's panto will take place this week when the boy Pedro Sánchez of PSOE attempts to get himself voted in as prime minister (president). There are other words and expressions that one could call on to describe the current state of non-government in Spain, but Mazza has opted for pantomime. How about total farce? Here's any one of the Brian Rix-style leaders of the four parties racing around the stage of the Whitehall Theatre with his trousers round his ankles. More tea, vicar?

Just to remind you, it is now over two months since there was an election. This coming week, there is the remote possibility that the boy Pedro might actually become prime minister (president). But it is only remote on account of the pantomime nature of the whole farrago. He's tied a pre-nuptial agreement with Ciudadanos, a party with two many syllables that is referred to more easily as the C's, and a right bunch of C's they are in some politicians' estimation (Pablo Iglesias of Podemos for one). Its leader is Albert Rivera, a youthful politician who, were he to trim his name down to Al Rivera, would sound like some dreadful crooning act from the 1970s appearing for the summer season on Hastings pier under the Al moniker but in reality being Les Reeves from Warrington.

But back at the panto, and who was it that the boy Pedro chose to reveal was behind him in a YouTube video designed to persuade the party membership that Al would make a suitable partner for a progressive and reforming government with Pedro at the helm? Yes, it was none other than Pablo Iglesias. But not that Pablo Iglesias. The Hairy One from Podemos may be able to boast facial hair and a great deal of hair full stop, but the Pablo behind Pedro was the one who founded PSOE in the days when socialists really were socialists, sported frightening moustaches, lectured everyone on Karl Marx and sang "The Internationale" and actually meant it.

Mariano, meanwhile, was sending a sort of love letter to Al. Convinced that the panto will descend into high farce, he was proposing a meeting after the boy Pedro fails to garner sufficient support in either of the upcoming Congress votes this week. "You know that I am always available," said Mazza, meaning that he is quite prepared (only prepared) to countenance any sort of link with the C's and PSOE if he's still prime minister (president). "A big hug," the letter concluded in the chummy way that letters are concluded in a Spanish style.

So, what can we expect this week? Well, let's ask the audience. Will Pedro become prime minister (president)? Oh yes he will. Oh no he won't.

The Four-Way Fight: Ciudadanos

In 2011, over the four days prior to the day of reflection (when campaigning and party political comment and opinion are supposed to cease), there wouldn't have been a case to have filled those four days with profiles of political parties. There were (and are) all sorts of parties knocking around, some of them regional, some of them more broadly based, but in 2011 there were only two which mattered - the Partido Popular and PSOE. The intervening four years have changed this. The number of parties which matter has doubled. The fight is not an even four-way fight - not where the estimations of seats in Congress are concerned - but it is a fight nevertheless, and it is one that is destined to change Spain's political scene, not just because two new parties could feature in the next government but also because these two parties represent a different type of politics. They are Ciudadanos (C's) and Podemos.

The first thing to say about the C's is that they aren't so new. As with other aspects of their existence, such as what they actually stand for, branding them as new is too easy. Initially moulded in 2005, they came from a movement called Ciudadanos de Catalunya - citizens of Catalonia - formed through disenchantment with established politics in that region. Within a year this platform had become a political party, adopting the name Ciudadanos-Partido de la Ciudadanía (C's for short). The party's first participation in an election was for the Catalonia regional election in November 2006. By then, its first president, who hadn't been one of the founders of the platform, was a 26-year-old Catalonian swimming champion and student of law who had briefly had a dalliance with the PP's Nuevas Generaciones. His name? Albert Rivera. 

That first election was to prove to be the making of the C's and of Rivera. Never before had a social movement or platform been able to convert itself into a political party and actually gain representation. It might not have seemed so at the time, but from the modest but nonetheless surprising gaining of three seats in the Catalonian parliament, Spain's new political age was being born.

The important point to be made about the C's is that they weren't in 2006 and nor are they now a radical party. Often lumped together with Podemos, they are done so through a misunderstanding that stems from apparent newness. Where similarity exists with Podemos is on issues such as inclusiveness (a more participative approach to the political process) and being adamant in a rejection of corruption and of the political status quo of the hitherto two-party system of the PP and PSOE.

Unlike Podemos, which was to grow out of an altogether wider and more vocal social movement and secure sudden and stunning electoral success, the progress of the C's has been more like a business which, once strong in its home market (Catalonia), expands into newer markets. The great achievement has been in not stumbling in a desire to grow.

Though they might not like to admit it, the C's have been aided by Podemos and by the intense focus placed on a new political age that Podemos have done so much to create. They have caught a wave, but it has to be acknowledged that, in their less vocal way, they (and the now forgotten Partido X) did the groundwork for Podemos to emerge so spectacularly.

As they aren't a radical party, where does the appeal lie? Partly, and this cannot be ignored, they have some attractive and youthful figureheads in the likes of Rivera and the now leader of the opposition in the Catalonian parliament, Inés Arrimadas. But good looks only get a party so far. The appeal comes from the assault on the corrupt two-party system and from policies of greater social justice and equality and probably also comes from the fact that, of the two parties taking on the PP-PSOE cosiness, they aren't as scary as Podemos.

Such an analysis reveals why the C's are described as both left and right-wing. Observers who draw these conclusions are again misunderstanding the party. It is a hybrid which can, on the one hand, hold firm views against Catalonian independence (a stance associated mainly with the right and one for which Rivera once received death threats) but which, on the other, can promote progressive taxation in a manner akin to the left.

For those who seek to condemn them as being almost a PP in disguise, there is evidence from a strong pro-business bias as well as a commitment to language teaching that has distinct echoes of the PP's trilingual teaching system in the Balearics. 

A clearer assessment of the C's might be, however, that they are wholly of a modern age, minus any baggage, with a mostly intelligent programme. Success on Sunday should come as no surprise.

The Podemos View Of Tourism

The general election campaign is creating  a good deal of debate regarding tourism: debate and recrimination. Podemos have unleashed the one-man battering-ram who is co-founder Juan Carlos Monedero. In the Balearics this week, he described the islands' tourism businesses as "predators" who think only about financial benefits. He was, one suspects, mainly aiming his ire in the direction of hoteliers.

While Monedero has been in full rant mode, the Podemos tourism thinker, Eric Labuske, has been outlining the party's line on tourism. This is something that has been a long time coming, as the Podemos tourism strategy has until now been largely unknown. Labuske's vision includes a fifteen-year strategic plan that would incorporate "social, cultural and environmental values". It would be one to rectify the mistakes of the past forty years (he could have made that fifty or more), with an independent regulatory body to supervise state regulation of tourism sustainability and tax incentives for all sectors of the industry in order to achieve this. Whatever it actually is. There would also be public participation in organisations such as Turespaña (the national tourism promotion agency), with the whole plan aimed at breaking the "monoculture" of sun-and-beach tourism, which he sees as the "main culprit" in having caused seasonality, a lack of innovation and property speculation.

As a manifesto, it is a fine set of platitudes, albeit that a fifteen-year strategic plan and the involvement of different agents in the tourism sector (plus the public) does have some merit. But it is one which, not unnaturally, has drawn some criticism. One of the sources is the tourism consultant, Antonio Garzón. You wouldn't expect him to side with Podemos, and nor does he. For example, he challenges the whole argument about forty years of mistakes. Without those years (of tourism development), where would the welfare of a majority of Spaniards be? Labuske argues that the sun-and-beach model is "obsolete", a charge that Garzón firmly disputes. The need is for complementary models of tourism, not the dismantling of the primary one.

It is on the whole issue of sustainability where Garzón lets fly. On the sustainability concept, he calls it a "hackneyed tourism myth", saying that the tourism sector doesn't need anyone (such as Podemos or indeed Més in the Balearics) to come up with a plan for it, when environmental management is "highly developed" in most of Spain's tourism destinations. And on this, Garzón is right. One only, as an example, has to think of the checks and balances that have prevented the development of the hotel complex near Es Trenc beach. 

The other new(ish) kids on the political block, Ciudadanos (C's), have had rather longer than Podemos to come up with their tourism policy. As a party they are almost ten years old now, and it might be suggested that it is this greater maturity which has pushed them well ahead of Podemos in the polls. The C's and the party leader, Albert Rivera, derive a great deal of support from the tourism sector: they are the polar opposite of Podemos in this regard.

One of their candidates for Congress, Francisco de la Torre, has been speaking this week about the C's programme for tourism, and fundamental to this would be the granting of hoteliers' wishes in cutting the tourist rate of IVA (VAT). It has been the failure of the Partido Popular to do this which, more than anything, has driven the tourism industry towards the C's. (The performance of Mallorca's Isabel Borrego as national secretary-of-state for tourism has been another.) Their plan is one for competitiveness.

The PP had promised prior to the last election that the tourist rate would go down to the super-reduced level of 4%. Instead, the Rajoy government put it up from 8% to 10%. The hoteliers were far from impressed. The C's are saying that there would be an intermediate reduction to 7%, with the aim of applying the super-reduced rate later. The party would also pursue a policy of language training and teaching, primarily with tourism in mind. Tourism professionals of the future, the C's say, must have a strong grasp on languages as a means of advancing tourism competitiveness. If they get into government, one can imagine some of the Balearic teaching brigade will prepare itself for another battle over language.

Citizen Rivera: Spain's general election

He may no longer be part of the Podemos leadership, but Juan Carlos Monedero seems rattled enough to have made his implication of cocaine snorting by the leader of Ciudadanos (the Citizens), Albert Rivera. The C's are rattling along, a poll at the weekend giving them 23% of the vote at the general election on 20 December, four points behind Rajoy and the Partido Popular, three points ahead of Pedro Sánchez and PSOE and almost a whole seven points in front of Monedero's old chum, Pablo Iglesias, and Podemos.

The C's and Podemos are, in a sense, from the same mould, one with democratic regeneration stamped onto it. They both share a dislike of the old, established ways of the two-party dominance of the PP and PSOE. They both abhor corruption. But after these points of similarity, the two diverge. The C's are being cast by the mould as the sensible party, while Podemos can't claim to always make sense.

There is a further similarity. Both made and have made the general election their chief goal. Prior to the regional elections, neither seemed unduly concerned with grabbing power, though Podemos and its various splinter or similar elements - in Madrid and Barcelona for instance - made high-profile gains. In the Balearics we are by now well used to Podemos wielding its power in the wings, determining government policy while remaining out of actual government.

Nevertheless, the eye on the main chance was one that was turned towards December. May was a useful boost to credibility, but the general election has been the ultimate prize. For the C's, they didn't have the same May success in the Balearics. Or anything like it, but they are now running PSOE a close third in the polls, above Podemos.

Congress currently has 350 seats (one says currently as the number can, theoretically, decrease or increase to 300 or 400). What is clear is that no one party is going to form a majority after the election unless something truly dramatic happens (Rajoy promising yet more cuts to income tax might succeed in harnessing increased support but not enough). The poll suggests that the PP will lose around 70 deputies. It would still gain the greatest share of the vote and the most seats, but in order to remain in government, there would have to be a coalition.

The C's might seem the obvious partner. This is a party that is often misrepresented. It isn't left-wing but nor can it be said that it is right-wing. It borrows from both wings, and on one issue - that of Catalonian nationalism - it is firmly on the right. So on nationalism, it is in the PP camp in rejecting independence. It is also perceived as being firmly pro-business. Spain's hoteliers have been "wowed" by Rivera, who has intimated that he would give them the super-reduced IVA (VAT) rate they have been demanding of the PP.

Support for the C's has not solely come from disaffected PP voters, and an understanding of its support is reflected by Podemos: it is too simple to say that they grab from right or left, because they are both generating and have been generating followers across the political spectrum. This support does, though, give the C's its poll rating of 23% share of the vote and between 82 and 84 seats, around 30 fewer than the PP. A coalition between the two would be sufficient to form a government, but would Rivera accept this?

Xavier Pericay, the leader of the C's in the Balearics, consistently said that the party would not enter into a pact after the regional election unless it won the largest share of the vote. It didn't have a cat in hell's chance of doing so, and despite the rising popularity of the C's nationally, nor - at present - does Rivera. It isn't wholly inconceivable that a sudden wave of support would push the C's into first place, but this does seem pretty unlikely. As Rivera has said the same as Pericay, what then would happen?

Into all this, one has to consider Sánchez and PSOE. The poll suggests it would lose some 30 seats, which would represent a total disaster for it, even worse than PSOE. So diminished, it would have to accept any scraps offered, but the C's, even if Rivera were to change his mind, wouldn't be able to scrape together a majority with PSOE. The worst possible outcome, bearing in mind the Balearic experience, would be that Podemos (with a possible 45 seats) enters into a pact with the C's and PSOE. This surely won't and can't happen.

Never say never, should, I guess, be the maxim. Rivera and the C's hold the aces. It might not get the largest share of the vote, but with the PP it could form a government. And the reason for doing so? Step forward, Prime Minister Rivera.

Lessons From Andalusia

On 22 March, Andalusia held its regional election. It had been caller because of a breakdown in the coalition government led by Susana Díaz of PSOE. The election returned PSOE as the most voted for party, with the same number of seats that it had obtained at the previous election, and while most post-electon analysis concentrated on the relative polling of different parties and what this might mean for elections elsewhere, such as here in the Balearics in under two weeks time, there was another aspect which may well have greater relevance to the Balearics. Although PSOE "won" the election, it failed to gain a majority, just as it had at the previous election. But unlike at that election, in March there was no obvious coalition candidate to come to PSOE's aid, and there still isn't. Consequently, Díaz said that she would govern with a minority. However, it isn't quite as simple as this (if forming a minority government can be described as simple). There is the matter of what other deputies in parliament think, and on Friday, they offered their thoughts. En bloc they voted against her investiture as president: in effect, Andalusia is currently without a government.

The parliament will hold another vote on Thursday. There may well be further votes but if, by the middle of July, Diáz has still not received support (or abstentions) that will enable her investiture, a new election will have to be called: those are the rules. Both Podemos and Ciudadanos have indicated a willingness to consider a pact - and the number of seats each has would be sufficient to create a majority - but there are strings attached. A fundamental principle of these two parties is their anti-corruption stance, and both have made it clear that a condition would be the removal of a former president, Manuel Chaves, from the national Congress of Deputies: he, as with Díaz's predecessor, is implicated in the enormous ERE (redundancy) scandal in Andalusia.

As things stand, Chaves will be on his way out after the Spanish general election in any event. Getting him to stand down now would, though, be symbolic: an act of commitment by PSOE to make a stand against corruption, alleged or otherwise. As this hasn't happened, neither Podemos nor Ciudadanos (C's) can accept entering into a coalition with Díaz.

The Chaves affair is just one way in which what is happening in Andalusia is similar to the Balearics. Here, the likelihood is that President Bauzá's Partido Popular will fall quite some way short of a majority on 24 May. With the support of the C's, it might just be possible that it could get a coalition majority, but the C's leader in the Balearics, Xavier Pericay, has ruled out a pact with any party unless the C's wins the most votes at the election (which it won't). Nevertheless, Pericay has said that the C's might be willing to give parliamentary support without entering a formal coalition, but there is one very big string attached. Pericay is making a similar demand to the one in Andalusia regarding Chaves. He wants Bauzá to get rid of José María Rodríguez as president of the PP in Palma because of his association with corruption.

Whether this happens or not, the outcome of the Balearic election is likely to give the same sort of situation as there is in Andalusia, except that the PP is the ruling party and not PSOE. Bauzá would gain the most votes and seats, but he would have no coalition partner, while PSOE may not be able to form a coalition majority as an alternative. It has been mooted that Bauzá might look to form a minority government, but what would happen if he tried to? Díaz is finding it difficult, and so would Bauzá. Opposition parties in the Balearics will be looking at what is happening in Andalusia with keen interest and they might well, in the event that Bauzá tries to govern in minority, simply block his investiture. So, a further election this year might have to be held, but there is another factor which has entered the equation: it is now being openly talked about the PP getting rid of Bauzá.

The word is that senior figures in the PP would, if the party fails to gain at least 25 seats (and the polls suggest that it would not), call an extraordinary congress and elect a new leader. This still might not allow a presidential investiture to go ahead if a minority government was contemplated, but it would be more likely. Alternatives, including the current mayor of Palma, Mateo Isern, are being spoken about, and he would surely have no problem with ousting Rodríguez.

Polls aren't of course always right, but if they are, then there will be great uncertainty after 24 May, and Andalusia might just give a clue as to how uncertain things will be.

The Politics Of Mallorca's Tourism

As the regional election draws closer, the Mallorcan Hoteliers Federation, which can often give the impression of being a party in its own right, has jumped the gun in having a new president. The appointment of Inmaculada de Benito was finally confirmed on Monday, and she becomes the first president of the federation who is not a hotelier: she is a career administrator-cum-hotel politician.

In the presence of various politicians as well as business leaders and of course hoteliers, de Benito sounded as though she really was a politician. "We must all work with a unity of action if we want to advance as a country," she said. As the national Minister for Employment was on the stage with her, this line might well end up in a Mariano Rajoy speech some time in the not too distant future.

The hotel and tourism industries being as they are - rather important - inevitably attract a great deal of political interest, and as I alluded to in this column last week, there is a growing momentum in the tourism industry behind the Ciudadanos (C's) party. A week may be a long time in politics but it has proved to be a short time in giving the C's even more momentum. In parts of Spain dominated by coastal tourism where the Partido Popular vote is forecast as "collapsing" in the regional elections, the C's are the next best or even preferred option. The presidents of two unnamed tourist business associations have said that they will back Albert Rivera's party, while in the Balearics, it would appear that there are any number of directors and other management of hotel chains who are willing to vote for the C's and to advise friends and members of their families to do likewise. The hotel industry, as I say, is a powerful political force, and not just in Mallorca.

Part of the political debate does centre on what the hoteliers perceive as potentially dangerous policies that parties on the left might unleash, such as a tourist tax. The C's would probably not entertain such a policy, although it is a mark of the desperation within the PP that the party has been branded leftist when it is generally considered not to be. The C's would, nevertheless, be a safer option for the industry if the PP vote does indeed collapse.

Cranking up the case against a tourist tax is Thomas Cook. Its director of contracting, Hans Müller, came out at the weekend with an attack on such a tax. "Every few years mistakes are repeated, and we are now faced with the danger that this idea (a tourist tax in the Balearics) could suddenly cost us everything that has been gained over the past four years (a reference to the Bauzá PP government)." He went on to say that he didn't think a tax was either "fair" or "smart" and that it would have the same effect as the old eco-tax: a loss of tourists.

Andalusia Is Spain: Regional election

Andalusia is the Spain we were sold. When the country ended its exile, the world was sold Andalusia: a vivid kaleidoscope of reds, blacks, oranges and yellows. Flamenco, bullfighting, citrus and heat: searing heat. Where Europe met Africa, Andalusia was a place apart, the exotica of its imagery etched firmly into a foreign consciousness. Spain was Andalusia.

Andalusia is still a place apart. While the whole of Spain suffered because of economic crisis, Andalusia suffered more than most. But it has always suffered. For all its imagery, complemented by the Costa del Sol, the golf courses, the marinas, the grand cities, it has always been a poor region. GDP per capita is the second lowest in Spain; only its neighbour Extremadura is poorer. Not that help has not been forthcoming. Over the years, roughly 50,000 million euros of European funds have been spent on it, but it has never remotely looked like becoming "one of Europe's most prosperous regions", as its former president, Manuel Chaves, said that by 2020 it would be. Youth unemployment, at desperate levels because of crisis, were at their worst in Andalusia and still are. The young of Andalusia, seduced by the good money of construction for tourism and foreign property buyers, preferred the building site to education, but when the building stopped they had nowhere to go except back to their families when the houses they had bought with the wages of concrete and with all-too-easy mortgages were repossessed.

It is a place apart in a political sense. Since it obtained autonomous community status in 1981 and started to elect its own regional government the following year, Andalusia has never known anything other than socialism; the PSOE brand of socialism. On Sunday, the people of Andalusia voted, the opinion polls confident that the PSOE dynasty was not about to be ended.

Susana Díaz became president in September 2013 when José Griñán stepped down. In January she ended the coalition with the IU (United Left) that PSOE had been forced into after the last election. The relationship between the two parties had deteriorated, as had that between Díaz and the leader of the IU, Antonio Maíllo. An election had to be called. Two months before other regional elections, the interest in it has been greater than it would otherwise have been. Here was the first real measure of how Podemos would do. Here also was a test of the centre-left Ciudadanos, which has appeared from almost nowhere to feature significantly in national opinion polls. But here also were potential indications of what other elections - regional and national - might hold for PSOE and the Partido Popular. For PSOE, defeat in Andalusia would be unthinkable, but a lowering of its percentage of the vote in 2012 (39.6%) would border on the disastrous; a confirmation of the inroads made by Podemos. The PP would know that the 40.7% of the 2012 vote was going to slump. But by how much? Though a PSOE stronghold, its share of the vote had generally been an upward one since 1990 when it could only just muster 22%.

As things turned out, disaster did strike. Susana Díaz said the victory was "historic", and it was; historic in the low percentage of the vote. PSOE won the same number of seats (47) as in 2012, but its share of the vote was down by over 4%. For the PP, a loss of 14% and 17 seats was bad but not as bad as opinion polls had suggested. Podemos, as had been expected, came in third, its performance in line with those opinion polls (15 seats and almost 15% of the share of the vote). The Ciudadanos surge was not as great as had been predicted (9 seats and just over 9% of the vote).

So, how does one interpret all this as an indication of what might happen in the other elections to come? Because of the strength of PSOE in Andalusia, it was always going to win, and this despite the corruption cases that have afflicted it in the region. Its 35.4% share of the vote is vastly greater than how it is performing in national opinion polls, the latest three of which have given it an average 19.3% share, but it probably says very little about other elections, other than to confirm that PSOE has failed to reassert itself against the PP. It is a hollow victory, and the PSOE hierarchy will know that it is.

The PP's share of the vote, poor though it was, was higher than how it currently rates in national opinion polls. There may be some consolation in this but it is certainly not a performance that will fill it with confidence. For the PP, PSOE isn't really the threat; it is the other parties.

There is a misguided view that Podemos is only killing PSOE. This simply isn't so, as the loss of support that the PP is suffering is due in no small part to Podemos and others. For Podemos, the Andalusia vote went much as had been anticipated. The share of the vote is seven points lower than how it is rated in national opinion polls, but the strength of PSOE in Andalusia was always going to mean that it couldn't match these national levels.

It would be overstating things to say that Podemos was the real victor in Andalusia, but the vote proves that when the electorate turns up to vote it doesn't suddenly have a change of heart and opt instead for the status quo of one or other of the two main parties. Podemos, and to a lesser extent Ciudadanos, have genuinely arrived.  

Andalusia, as it always has been, is a place apart. The election confirms this only in terms of PSOE's victory. Otherwise, the election shows that it is Spain, and for Spain, Andalusia now poses a big question - with which party does PSOE form a coalition? If it is Podemos, then the shape of Spain's politics for the next four to five years may well have been formed in Andalusia.

The Perils Of Meddling With Town Halls

Ciudadanos is one of what can seem like a baffling array of political parties that are positioned to the left of centre. It is a comparatively new entity, having been formed in 2006 initially as a party in Catalonia but which is now country-wide. It has performed reasonably well in its Catalonian heartland (nine parliamentary seats at the 2012 election) but less well nationally; it has no deputy in Congress. Nevertheless, a recent poll suggested that the party could take 12% of the national vote, which is an extraordinarily high poll rating when one considers the support for Podemos.

Ciudadanos is a reminder that reforming parties had been created some years before Podemos came on the scene. Changes to the political system, anti-corruption, Ciudadanos has had something of the Podemos philosophy without drawing as much attention to itself. It was a creation of a time that well pre-dated Podemos when great misgivings with the current political system were already been voiced. Almost simultaneous with its founding was that of the centrist Unión Progreso y Democracia (UPyD), which has also placed emphasis on political reform and with which pacts have been suggested but ruled out.

One area of reform that Ciudadanos (C's) and the UPyD have in common is that of local government. The UPyD has previously advocated reducing the number of town halls in Spain. The president of C's, Albert Rivera, agrees. He proposed the other day that town halls be cut by a massive 7,000, to leave only 1,000 and did so within the context of a programme of "democratic regeneration". In this, the emphasis differs to that of the UPyD, which has pointed to the massive cost savings that could be made.

But is Rivera's proposal contradictory? A strong argument in favour of small units of local government is that they benefit democracy. Localism increases citizen involvement, it hastens and improves decision-making, it acts as a buttress against corruption of more centralised forms of government. These small units can be and are tiny. In Mallorca the tiniest is Escorca with fewer than 300 people, greatly outnumbered by the local goat population.

This theory of localism is not, however, well observed in practice. Town halls may be better at understanding local issues and so making informed decisions, but as for citizen involvement and corruption, the evidence in favour doesn't stack up. There is repeated criticism of the lack of transparency and information at town halls, which therefore limits involvement, while corruption cases or allegations of corruption are never too far from the surface. Just consider that at present there are investigations related to Andratx, Calvia (the radio affair), Felanitx, Lloseta, Marratxi, Pollensa, Vilafranca. Go back over time and you will find any number of cases of corruption, allegations and electoral fraud. It might be noted that the leader of the El Pi party, Jaume Font, was once disqualified for eight months from public office because of such a fraud in Sa Pobla, which he denied. (And he subsequently romped home as mayor.)

For all the faults with local, town hall government, Rivera's proposal sounds like one that would replace one imperfect system with another. If localism, warts and all, is truly a more democratic form of government, then how would drastically undermining it result in democratic regeneration? The UPyD line, that of greater efficiencies in terms of cost and administration, has, on the face of it, more merit, but however the case for reducing the number of town halls is styled, a reduction would bring with it perils.

The UPyD suggested three years ago that towns with fewer than 20,000 people in Mallorca should be merged. In other words the town halls would be merged. Under this suggestion, there would be only five municipalities that would be unaffected. For modernisers and, dare I say it, those with a British perspective on such matters, the suggestion would make sense; it is undeniable that services in smaller towns are comparatively and proportionally more expensive than in larger towns. But it is a suggestion that flies in the face of the sociology and culture of the villages and towns. The town hall is symbolic of local identity. It may not be the final word in efficiency. It may not be without its dodginess, but when there are villages like Buger (fractionally more than 1,000 people) which can celebrate anniversaries of "independence", the importance of village identity and of its prime institution makes tampering with that institution extremely risky.

The risk may explain why national government has shied away from radical reform. Significant reductions in the number of councillors (which will be the case with this year's elections) are as far as it has gone. It might be said that it has missed the opportunity, presented by economic crisis, to effect real reform, but was there ever the stomach for it?

Ciudadanos - Alcúdia Political Party

Oops. A bit of an oversight in "Talk Of The North" when listing the candidates for Alcúdia mayor. Missed out none other than Francisco of Don Pedro and the "Ciudadanos". So here's the poster.