The tax reform faces final consideration in Congress, with Podemos threatening to overturn it

The European Union-imposed multinational tax law, which adds part of the budget package announced by the government, reaches its final vote in Congress on Thursday, with several details of the articles up in the air and with the Podemos threatens to vote against and abandon the project.

After going through the process at the Finance Committee, which had to be extended for more than seven hours to obtain support, the law will end up in the plenary, still with the uncertainty whether the law will ultimately pass, given the vulnerability of the support. that the government has. At the moment the text does not include the banking and energy taxes that are necessary Sumar, Podemos, ERC, EH Bildu and BNG.

In order to get the text approved in committee, the PSOE had no choice but to promise ERC, BNG and EH Bildu to try to approve the bank tax during the plenary next Thursday through a transactional amendment by PSOE and Junts that was included in the commission was rejected; as well as extending the tax on energy companies by decree for one year, despite the fact that it had previously agreed with Junts to allow it to die on December 31. The Ministry of Finance even published a statement after the committee voted to say that, apart from that promised decree, the agreement with Junts was maintained to allow energy companies that invest in energy decarbonization, which is virtually all companies in the sector, not to be taxed.

Although it may seem contradictory, the socialist spokesperson in Congress, Patxi Lopezsaid it is “very compatible” that there could be a tax on energy companies, except those that also use their profits to invest in decarbonizing the economy.

For his part, ERC spokesperson Gabriel Rufián urged the government to announce the decree law on the energy tax and gave until Thursday to prevent “a problem” from arising in the plenary. Meanwhile, EH Bildu spokesperson Oskar Matute has pointed out that he has a negotiated agreement with the government so he is confident that it will be fulfilled and that is why he will vote in favor of the project during the plenary on Thursday.

When the government finally gets the support of all its investment partners; It remains to be seen what will be done by Podemos, which warns that it will only decide if it sees a real proposal to extend the tax on energy companies.

The vote against the purple formation would result in a draw 175 votes between the investiture bloc on the one hand and PP, Vox, UPN and Podemos on the other. If this occurs a maximum of three timeswould strike the law as set forth in Rule 88.1 of the Rules of Congress.