The Popular Party takes to the Plenary of the Congress of Deputies of this week a motion addressed to the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaskain which denounces its “omission” in the management of “the worst natural catastrophe that has devastated Spain in recent times”.. In an eight-page document, the Popular Party argues that citizens “do not deserve the response (often by omission) of this executive. In addition, they demand that the Government adopt a long list of measures divided into 14 points.
“Unfortunately, the Government, and first and foremost its president, has resigned from its responsibilities: an en bloc resignation of the Executive’s responsibilities“The Popular Party maintains, and then adds: “Also of the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, holder of fundamental competences in the management of this crisis”.
While the Government puts the focus on Carlos Mazón and the meal in which the Valencian president remained until 18.00 hours the day the DANA broke out, the PP wonders what the Minister of the Interior was doing at that time. “I do not know what he did on that date or in the following days. Nor is it known what his participation in the crisis committee constituted at 11:00 p.m. on October 29th.”
The objective pursued by the Popular Group with this motion, therefore, is “to know what the Minister of the Interior has done before, during and after the DANA”. A necessary question, defend the popular, since Grande-Marlaska holds “fundamental powers in the prevention and management of the response to this misfortune.” The PP argues that the minister should have declared the emergency situation of national interest.
Not doing so was “a manifest example of the omission” of the Ministry of the Interior, which should have coordinated the State’s response to the catastrophe and made “available to the territorial administrations affected” the necessary resources to deal with the situation. But Fernando Grande-Marlaska “has disengaged”, says PPwho knows on what grounds”.
In response to this omission, the Popular Party proposes to the Congress of Deputies to urge the Government to take a series of measures. The first of these is to activate the Emergency Plan that the Executive already put in place at the end of 2020 due to the pandemic.
Among the actions of the Plan, the PP proposes to increase the provision of means for cleaning and waste treatment to emergency services; to allocate additional resources for the identification of victims; to review the prevention policy of Civil Protection; to update the UME protocol and the State Security Forces and Corps or increase the resources of the Emergency Prevention Fund.
They also propose a reinforcement of the Civil Guard and the National Police in Valencia, as well as in the National Alert Network, “to be a fast and effective system of communication of warnings”. In a second point, the PP asks the Government to meet the requests of all affected municipalities, and urges him to create a portal to manage the processing of aid to citizens. Another proposal consists of “developing a complete plan to attend to the needs of repair of the vehicle fleet“.
In the fifth point, the Popular Party advocates making the autonomously-owned housing available to people who need to be rehoused. The sixth section is dedicated to “palliate the impact of the DANA on companies, the self-employed and workers.”. The PP calls for ensuring the proper management of ERTEs and the deployment of a “contingency plan” so that those affected by an ERTE or ERE receive their benefits “on time”.
A seventh point addressed to the Ministry of Education calls for the creation of a fund for “the financing of all necessary actions to recover the educational activity” in the affected areas. Another proposal, this time directed at transport, is the exemption of the payment of transport passes for six months, which can be extended. The next proposal consists of creating “a psychological office to follow up on those affected”, and also urges the executive to create lines of aid for the emergency expenses of the affected communities. Finally, the PP asks the Ministry of Ecological Transition to undertake “the necessary actions to recover the riverbeds and ravines, as well as their conservation in the face of the risk of flooding”.