Sanchez confirms that the government is negotiating with the European Commission that there will be no road tolls in 2024

Pedro Sanchez, the Socialist candidate for the 23rd general election and head of government, insisted on Friday that the executive is not considering the possibility of road tolls in 2024 and that they are negotiating with the European Commission. The socialist leader recognized this proposal Included in the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan agreed with the European Commission, But he maintains that possibility has been withdrawn because circumstances have changed in the past two years, with the country overcoming a pandemic and now reeling from war. We have changed this position with the European Commission, and this is what we are negotiating. Sanchez confirmed in an interview 1 hour from RTVE. And the socialist leader stressed during his speech that the blockade imposed on the renewal of the judiciary, which will be five years old next September, was “one of the biggest frustrations” that he experienced as prime minister.

Faced with the specific question of whether the Spaniards, therefore, would not pay to use the motorways in 2024, the Socialist candidate answered “no”, and said that they were in fact already paying less by removing tolls from many motorways. “What I did is raise 1,000 kilometers of tolls,” he said. Sanchez complained about the “hypocrisy” that appears in his opinion “political and media right” in this matter because the former head of government Mariano Rajoy (PP), as he pointed out, did not raise the tolls “but rather prolonged them”, and Sanchez himself was also forced during his presidency to assume the “disaster” of the radial highways, estimating the cost of the public rescue at more than 1,000 euros, as he estimated its cost at one million euros. .

Controversy over highway tolls increased during the election campaign, especially after the confrontation between Pedro Sánchez and the leader of the People’s Party, Alberto Núñez Viejo, in Atresmedia. The popular candidate showed the cameras a map of Spain and asked his opponent if he would charge all highways. “What. You say!. Really, Mr. Vigo. As the former president of the Xunta de Galicia, you know that we have edited the cartoons in Galicia”, Sanchez affirmed. Some of the statements made by the General Director of Traffic, Perry Navarro, a few days later, in which he indicated that in 2024 there will be highway tolls “by imposing Brussels” brought the issue back to the fore. A committee He specified on Thursday that the Spanish plan is considering a mobility regulation that sets out payments for road use and that it should come into force by 2024..

This Friday, the last day of the election campaign, the Socialist leader once again responded to the matter on public television. During the interview, Sanchez acknowledged that the fee was in the 2021 Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan — a document in which the government commits to agreeing milestones and reforms in return for the 80,000 million European subsidies it does not have to repay that have been granted because of the pandemic — but emphasized that it does not appear in the document now being negotiated. “It is true that this possibility is included in the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, and it is also true that in the negotiations that we are conducting on the addendum with the European Commission, this possibility has already been withdrawn. Because? Because human, things happened from 2021 to 2023. Among other things, we have not only overcome the pandemic, but we are also suffering from war. The reality is what it is, it is dynamic, we have changed this position with the European Commission, and that is what we are negotiating. And also, in the sustainable mobility bill that we are negotiating. We drafted it and which we will present to the Cortes in the next legislature, it is not included,” he replied to this.

Regarding the non-renewal of the General Council of the Judiciary (GGPJ), Sanchez made it clear that they are not considering making a new change in the system for electing members of the Board of Judges. Admitting that “there is no way and no alternative”, he again accused the blockade that had been imposed by the Congress party all this time. I think all of this is one of the great crises and great frustrations that I have felt as head of government. I have to admit it, because behind this blockade imposed by the People’s Party, and its failure to renew the CGPJ, which is a constitutional mandate, there is a very dangerous political background and message, or at least it seems to me, which is the lack of recognition of the legitimacy of the parliamentary majority, which is what supported the work of my government, “he said. At another point in the conversation, he said: “Brussels looked at the People’s Congress Party and referred to the party as the main person responsible for the blockade.”

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