During a recent press conference, Ivan Espinosa de los Monteros and Jorge Buxade presented the economic program for Spanish political party VOX, in anticipation of the country’s imminent general elections on the 23rd of July.
With the former usually cited as representing the party’s liberal wing, and the latter its interventionist faction, their role here seems to be symbolic of a synthesis of these strands.
They listed economic sectors reeling under the death grip of a years-long downturn in a country whose recovery from COVID-19 lags behind that of its partners at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
Importantly, it also included Orban-esque, pro-natalist measures, like the suppression of VAT for families buying their primary residence and a progressive reduction of income tax depending on the number of children in a household (eliminating it completely for families with four children and income below €70,000).
Liberalisation
As the press conference suggested, the program includes massive tax cuts. De-regulation and pro-business legislation, a promise to help the self-employed, together with the reduction of subsidies for trade unions are obvious, economically liberal, proposals. These are coupled with a general commitment to “draw up balanced budgets, aiming at the progressive elimination of the deficit and public debt.”
VOX’s specific proposals include:
- Developing a new pension model;
- Reducing personal income tax to two rates: 22% (for €12,000-€60,000 incomes) and 30% (incomes over €60,000). Anyone making less than €12,000 per year will not pay income tax;
- Cutting corporate income tax from 25% to 22% and, in the long term, to 12.5%;
- Decentralising collective bargaining and allowing individual agreements between employees and management, also facilitating the individual worker’s violation of strikes;
- Reducing the public workforce and replacing less than 50% of those public sector workers who leave their position, with exceptions like the defence sector;
- Closing public agencies and privatising many state-owned companies (including the airport management company, AENA);
- Reforming the special fiscal status of the Basque country within Spain;
- Ending subsidies to a host of entities and activities, including trade unions; and
- Privatising public television and radio stations.
Unfortunately, the program does not include a breakdown of expected savings from cost-cutting measures, nor does it detail desirable expenses. The result is that the party has left itself open to criticism that the reduction in financing would leave the state unable to pay for public services—services VOX does not intend to suppress.
One could suggest that, despite tax cuts, the state’s coffers will be compensated by employment generation and VAT due to an upswing in spending. Again, however, the program would benefit from estimates and numbers.
It is also surprising that the program does not describe the creation of state companies in strategic sectors, which voters may have expected as a balance to its more liberal elements.
On reducing regional governments and suppressing certain organs, we read:
We will undertake a systematic and thorough review of Public Administrations, aiming to rationalise their structure and functions, as well as that of the different agencies and entities belonging to the Spanish public sector, listing and eliminating all those agencies that are unnecessary or merely ideological. In turn, we will audit and eliminate all public spending related to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the 2030 Agenda.
Another principle target for suppression is the Ministry of Equality, whose function has been to implement contemporary post-modern feminism:
We will abolish the Ministry of Equality and create a Ministry of the Family in its place. This new Ministry will direct its efforts towards implementing policies that promote the birth rate by means of a National Plan for the birth rate and support to the family.
Natalism
With respect to its “resolute support for raising the birth rate,” as mentioned above, the program champions a thorough reduction of tax burdens (VAT and income) for families with children. It further states that VOX
Will promote fiscal and sanitary measures, psychological measures, or measures to increase access to social services, in order to raise the birth rate. No one should be discouraged from having a child for lack of support from the administration. We will place families at the centre of all public policies. The approval of any new regulation will include a study that evaluates its real impact on the lives of families.
Specific fiscal incentives are included, for example:
We will reduce the Property Transfer Tax by 100% for the purchase of a primary residence, whose price is less than or equal to €300,000, reducing it in other cases to 6% and to 3% for large families.
We will amend the law so that Real Estate Tax can be subsidised, as in the case of families in which one of the spouses decides to dedicate himself/herself to the care of his/her children …
We will apply a progressive reduction of taxes and levies on family household utilities (electricity, water, gas, …), especially for large families.
Other specific proposals
One radical proposal worth highlighting is that of changing how land is classified in Spain. At present, land is, by default, non-urbanisable, so that one has to request an exemption, so to speak, in order to build on land one owns. VOX would reverse this so that private land is developable by default, unless a specific reason for it to be otherwise can be cited:
We will free all land that is not or should not be specifically protected for reasons related to the environment, landscape, production, or national defence. We will promote a new Land Law that foresees the liberation of land sequestered by city councils and regional governments for the benefit of corrupt parties and politicians, and that ensures a correct, agile, and harmonious urban development throughout Spain.
In order to judge the program’s approach to specific industries, we may hone in on one prominent sector, that of tourism. VOX is proposing the
Homogenization of regulations regarding tourist housing for touristic purposes in all of Spain. This standardisation of regulations will guarantee competition on equal terms with other tourist accommodations, such as hotels or campsites; it will ensure the preservation of the rights of resident neighbours and the life of neighbourhoods; and it will limit the increase in the price of housing caused by the massive proliferation of tourist apartments.
This seems to be addressing Airbnb and similar platforms, in which context VOX would limit the home owner’s ability to rent a property during the holidays in order to benefit the hotel sector, which is problematic. Indeed, the idea that the same regulation for tourism, rents, and hotels should apply in the Costa del Sol as in Madrid is questionable.
Closing thoughts
In terms of the program’s lack of specificity in certain points, we may attribute this to the snap elections and consequent scramble for parties to present their plans. VOX knows it will not be able to actually implement its policies and so has imbued elements of its plan with a more “programmatic” character. For example, while it promotes protectionist measures, it does not explain how it would negotiate their implementation with Spain’s EU partners.
In general, however, the electorate gets a clear sense of what the party wants and how it is different from its potential future coalition partner, the centre-right PP.
