Pedro Sánchez announced yesterday that Spain will increase its military spending by €10 billion this year, although only 20% of that figure will be allocated to the purchase of equipment and materials, while 35% will go to raising the salaries of the military. With this increase, Spanish spending on security and defense will reach 2% of GDP this year, totaling more than €33 billion.
Sánchez thus contradicts himself, once again, regarding what he and his government had assured just three months earlier. On January 27th, following the visit of NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, La Moncloa had stated that “the President of the Government has underlined our country’s firm commitment to reach 2% investment in defense by 2029″…
Well, there will be no need to wait that long; it will be this very year. However, since the current government does not have a budget – nor is it preparing one – and Sánchez knows that his coalition partner – the communists of Sumar – will never support this increase in spending (in fact, they continue to publicly talk about leaving NATO), Pedro Sánchez has opted to “scrape together” these €10 billion from various unexecuted budget items in order to avoid putting his rearmament plan through Parliament, where only the opposition, the PP (People’s Party), seemed willing to support this measure.
As usual, government-aligned media unequivocally explain the many advantages of not putting an increase in spending, which turns the Defense budget into the second largest in the state after pensions, through Parliament. Thus, for example, El País explains that “The decision not to go to Congress frees Feijóo from having to take a position on a state matter that he fundamentally shares with the PSOE (Socialist Workers’ Party) and prevents the coalition from voting divided.” Undoubtedly, removing major spending decisions from Parliament is full of advantages. And given the parliamentary minority that the government has reflected for months, it is undoubtedly a path to follow from now on.
When Sánchez was asked if he intended to comply with the constitutional obligation to present a budget, the President of the Government stated that “The Constitution may have some nuances”…
Does it? You can judge for yourselves regarding what Article 134 of the Constitution states: “The Government must present the General State Budgets to the Congress of Deputies at least three months before the expiration of the previous year’s budgets”…
