The Popular Parliamentary Group joined the opposition parties on Tuesday in rejecting five of the six points of a motion by the Vox Parliamentary Group against settlement policies and distribution of undocumented immigrants and in defense of the implementation of a protocol to determine the age of immigrants, among other requests.
The PP did join Vox in voting in favor of the point that rejected the arbitrary distribution of immigrants who arrived illegally to other regions of Spain and the need to take appropriate legal actions against any administrative resolution of the Spanish Government resulting from agreements between the PSOE and separatist parties.
PP procurator Emilio José Berzosa rejected five of the six points of the Vox motion as «alarmist» and accused Santiago Abascal’s party of trying to offer an «unrealistic image» to suggest to citizens that immigrants come to Spain to live off everyone’s money, something «completely false.»
«We will not allow Vox’s fear or demagogy to distort the serious and responsible work carried out by the Junta,» Berzosa concluded, reaffirming the regional government’s commitment to «a solidarity and inclusive Castilla y León» and to «a land that is supportive, responsible, and capable of integrating those most in need.»
«All for one, like in Fuenteovejuna,» joked proposing procurator Miguel Suárez Arca, warning the PP that by voting against most of the Vox motion, they are committing «an absolute outrage» and «pushing thousands of people to die at sea» while political parties «trade with their misfortune.»
Suárez Arca also explained that the six points of the motion defended today in the Cortes de Castilla y León come from agreements signed by the PP in the Balearic Islands or in Murcia. «The Popular Party is like a hydra, it has a lot of heads but you can no longer see the feet, that’s what happens when you have no principles or values,» he reproached.
«Let’s see if for once we can unite,» exclaimed Suárez Arca at the beginning of his argument in defense of the motion, in which he also addressed the Junta de Castilla y León to ask them to «do their job for once and, in this case, fulfill the competences that they do have, no matter how much they deny it, in matters of unaccompanied foreign minors.»
On the other hand, Socialist procurator María Soraya Blázquez rejected the Vox motion for «unacceptable and baseless racism» and stated that when migrant minors flee their countries of origin, they do not do so for pleasure, «they do it in search of a future without hunger, without wars, without violence.»
Blázquez warned that the Vox motion only seeks confrontation and tries to generate fear in society, advocating for the need to address immigration «with common sense» and to welcome people «with dignity and guarantees.»
Similarly, Unidas-Podemos procurator Pablo Fernández labeled the Vox motion as «racist and xenophobic garbage that spreads and disseminates hatred and aporophobia» and accused the proponents of being strong with the weak «and extremely weak with the strong and powerful,» of whom they are «lackeys, vassals, and stewards.»
«It is much more costly for the public coffers to have a parasite and leech like Santiago Abascal, who has spent his whole life living off the public, sucking from the system and bouncing from one position to another, than any unaccompanied foreign minor we may welcome in this region,» defended the Unidas-Podemos representative.
«You are persistent and annoying; but not original,» said Soria ¡Ya! spokesperson Ángel Ceña, in response to Vox’s new initiative to «propagate» and garner «a handful of tweets» against immigration, which, as the Sorian politician explained, «cannot be stopped.»
Ceña criticized the «absolute lack of definition» in Vox’s proposals, which he considered «completely absurd,» and called on Santiago Abascal’s party to reflect on the countries from which the people who have come to work in Castilla y León originate.
And procurator Francisco Igea rejected the Vox motion but requested a separate vote on the six points of the motion to know the explicit position of the PP in each case. «Which PP are we talking about today, the one from Murcia, the one from Mañueco on the way to Feijóo, the one from Feijóo on the way to Mañueco, the one from Feijóo this week, the one from Feijóo two weeks ago…?» asked the Valladolid politician ironically.