The groups have met the week of December 12 to address the most problematic issues of trans law. This is the main conclusion drawn from the meeting of the presentation this Wednesday, which augurs a bitter and tense debate in the Equality Commission, with lights and stenographers, around gender self-determination in minors between 14 and 16 years that the PSOE asked to limit through an amendment.
This is the main stumbling block that currently separates the socialists of United We Can and the rest of the parliamentary allies in favor of the norm. Neither the PSOE nor Unidas Podemos get off the bandwagon in their demands, although both parties lower their tone and highlight the progress, as well as the “negotiating spirit”.
In addition to the amendment on minors, the PSOE keeps other amendments alive for discussion of the law in the parliamentary body, such as the one remove references to intragender violence (the one that takes place within the LGTBI couple) to avoid equating the victims of this group with those of gender violence.
As both the PSOE and Unidas Podemos have assured at the end of the closed-door meeting on Wednesday (from which the president of the commission, carmen bald), the groups have agreed incorporate around 20 amendments to the opinion and transact two other fixesbut without offering more information about it.
“Some socialist amendment has been accepted and there is also from Podemos. Now a new phase in the work is beginning, the spirit is negotiating on the part of all the groups. We are going to start a negotiating phase that includes all the groups and all the amendments. The work is advanced, shortly we will convene that commission”, has added the deputy and secretary of Equality of the PSOE Andrea Fernandez.
For her part, the spokeswoman for the branch of the purple group, Sofia Castañon, has highlighted the “great parliamentary advance” that means closing the paper. “Our position is clear, we want the parliamentary procedure to serve to improve the law, in no case go back on the text that has come out of the Council of Ministers”, he assured.
From the PSOE they insist that the negotiations have been in line with “all the parliamentary groups, except the PP and Vox.” This is not a minor issue, since Unidas Podemos pointed to a possible pact between its coalition partners and the PP to include in the trans law the limitation of gender self-determination in minors.
These fears were expressed by the Minister of Equality herself, Irene Montero, last Monday, increasing the tension between the two forces in a difficult week for the government coalition due to the clashes fueled by this and other regulations. Even though, although in relation to the trans law they are still far away in the positions, they share the forecast that Congress will approve the law before the end of the year.
