Everyone is interested (and well) with the scenarios of what could happen to the Budget: agreement with PS, agreement with CHEGA, approval without agreement, rejection of the Budget.
But no one has analyzed the hypothesis I am going to mention, which is totally original in current constitutionalism and could generate a Kafkaesque situation.
In summary: the hypothesis is that in the initial vote in general, the PS or CHEGA make it possible for the Budget to be discussed in the specialty, then profound changes to the Budget are approved by the Opposition and in the final global vote the Budget will be approved with the vote against by the parties that support the Government.
As the late Fernando Pessa would say, “and this one, huh?”. Let’s get to it then.
AD – VOTE AGAINST THE BUDGET?
It may therefore happen that a Budget for 2025 is approved with the PSD and CDS voting against.
Faced with this, the AD is left in a Kafkaesque situation: either it accepts to govern and implement the Opposition’s priorities or it resigns and runs the risk of voters holding it responsible for early elections that they supposedly do not want.
When I had this anagnosis, I remembered that Professor Tiago Duarte – who was my intern, later partner and always a friend – had addressed this topic in his doctoral thesis (“The law behind the budget: the constitutional question of the budget law” ).
Tiago Duarte, in 2006, scientifically concluded that (i) despite not applying the “Travão Law” when voting on the Budget, and (ii) deputies being able to freely vote on changes to the Budget in their specialty, it would be unconstitutional to “distort” the Budget forcing the Government to apply what does not correspond to its strategy.
That’s why I called him and learned that apparently the doctrine and subsequent jurisprudence did not analyze the matter, so there are no precedents that could guide us.
Legally, the border between changes approved in the specialty that are admissible and those that are inadmissible because they distort the Budget is always debatable, even if Professor Tiago Duarte’s thesis prevails. And it should be the Constitutional Court that defines the solution in the abstract and in the specific case.
But this will only happen if the President of the Republic calls for preventive inspection of the Budget Law, which has never happened. And, if you don’t do so, successive inspections will not prevent the Budget from coming into force and the decision will take months, making it (almost) irrelevant in the specific case.
They will tell me that the feasibility of this happening depends on the PS and CHEGA approving changes together or on CHEGA abstaining from proposals that the united Left proposes. And some will say that this doesn’t make any sense.
It won’t. But it has already been done: months ago they approved, against the Government, a different model of the IRS reduction, the end of tolls on motorways in the interior, the reduction in the value of IRS rents and VAT on electricity.
As they used to say, “the occasion makes the thief”, neither wants elections and both are afraid of being blamed by voters for bringing them forward.
Nothing better than trying to pass the blame to the PSD, even more so if because of this many hundreds of euros of benefits voted by the PS don’t materialize and it COMES as if there was no tomorrow.
In short: perhaps the PSD should think twice and try even more to reach an agreement before the initial vote on the Budget.
PROPOSAL TO SAVE THE FOREST (EPISODE 2)
While we wait for the outcome of the Budget soap opera, let’s look again at the tragic film about the fires.
My program “Save the Forest?”, last week, produced a lot of reactions, and I thank those who wrote to me or questioned me in occasional meetings.
Let us remember what I defended: either one chooses the resignation of letting it burn and trying to alleviate it with some palliatives, a few pinches of pedagogy and millions of liters of water, all wrapped up in a lot of money, or one has to have the courage to act and risk criticism.
What I propose is:
a) Treat the forest as a productive business activity and regulate it;
b) Require a minimum size of viability to allow private or social business exploration;
c) Require those who carry out such activity to carry out annual cleaning and risk control plans, with penalties;
d) If after a certain (short) period what is required is not done, the State should present a proposal for the general acquisition of land in these situations based on prices that correspond to fair market values, assuming no additional construction and prohibiting it. a in the future;
e) For those who (i) do not sell to the State, (ii) do not associate to obtain the minimum size required, (iii) do not choose to sell to entities that guarantee the minimum size, and (iv) for land whose owners they do not know or cannot identify, the State must expropriate what exists through a system that is quick and effective;
f) After that, the State must open competitions to grant lots of these lands with an economic dimension that makes them viable for forestry exploration;
g) Finally, the State must subsidize part of the land cleaning expenses.
I received criticism (that the State is worse than the private sector, that I defend confiscation, that it would be better for the State to carry out the cleaning and assume the costs, etc.), but above all applause and in some cases suggestions that would be useful (and some convinced) if one day the political system would gain the courage to face the problem.
I still don’t believe it, but I think it’s worth returning to the topic quickly.
FOREST: SAVED IN 2042?
Last Saturday, Diário de Notícias published an excellent work by Rui Miguel Godinho which, among other aspects, reveals:
a) “More than half of the country has land without a known owner”, is the title of the text;
b) More than half of the metropolitan municipalities (153 out of 278) do not yet have a cadastral record of their land, this being mainly located in the North and Interior where smallholdings predominate;
c) In addition to Greece, Portugal will be the only country in the European Union without a general registry;
d) For bureaucratic reasons, no information from the simplified registration information system of the Balcão Único do Prédio (BUPi), well implemented in the North, with voluntary adherence by municipalities and free of charge, has so far been used to carry out or update the registration;
e) There has been legislation since 2023 that allows the State in 2026 and in “priority territorial areas of intervention” to take control of “no man’s land”, of which it is not known who the owners are because no one has claimed them.
The case of these “buildings without a known owner” is very curious. Since 1966, the Civil Code (art. 1345) states that “immovable things without a known owner are considered State assets”.
And since Decree-Law No. 15/2019 of January 21st, after a complex process, the provisional registration by nature for 15 years of such land as acquired in favor of the State has been allowed, after which the registration becomes definitive.
After five years, Público stated this year in January that “the diploma has not yet come into operation”. And it really seems that only when the BUPi process ends at the end of 2025 does the State intend to start implementing the diploma. In other words, in the best case scenario we will have this finished in 2042… if there is still any forest left.
It is no wonder that DN refers to a “wild west situation”. And, without a doubt, I was much more convinced of the justice and necessity of what I proposed.
TRASH AND WINE: QUESTIONS WITH ANSWERS
I’m happy that some of the questions I’m asking here, often sent by citizens I don’t even know, are starting to get answers.
This is the case with the announcement of an ambitious strategy by Carlos Moedas (comparable to what he recalled that he is doing with Housing) to make Lisbon cleaner and to this end, include an increase in tourist taxes.
And it is also the case – announced yesterday by Público – that finally the Tax Authority (ATA) will collaborate with the Vine and Wine Institute (IVV) and the Regional Viticulture Commissions (CVR) to control the entry of wine to in bulk in the regions where it comes from – I am told that often – as local wine.
In the same direction, action will be taken in the Douro Demarcated Region (including the exclusivity of using grapes from the region for winemaking). And, what I said is essential, there will be new labeling rules so that we don’t drink wine from all over the world thinking it’s Portuguese.
Please continue to send me questions (as happened in these cases) because I love being a herald or amplifier of sounds…
THE PRAISE
Luís Montenegro, for the national unity he achieved in choosing the new PGR, for managing expectations, for the Income and Price Agreement approved today, and for the way he put together a calm strategy to face the (apparently) insoluble problem of approving the Budget.
Anyone who had doubts would lose them if they reread on tape what André Ventura is saying in successive contradictions, and above all, listen to PNS declaring (enthusiastically and making activists at a regional congress in the Azores blush) “I would rather lose elections than giving up our convictions.”
It really is a job to get the opposition leader to offer the slogan for the Government’s election campaign for free…
READING IS THE BEST MEDICINE
“Chiquinho” (Caminho), by Baltasar Lopes, now republished, is a seminal book in Cape Verdean literature. From 1947 to today it maintains the freshness that quality allows.
“Visitar Amigos” (D. Quixote) is a beautiful collection of short stories by Luísa Costa Gomes, just released. I have already read the first (“Dictatorship of the Proletariat”) and have gained an appetite for the others.
Read and the Portuguese Language Culture thanks you.
THE UNANSWERED QUESTION
Yesterday at Gulbenkian, presentation of the reissue of the book with the interview in 3 volumes by Maria João Avillez to Mário Soares almost 30 years ago.
It’s been many years since I’ve seen such a sublime moment about a political figure and Mário Soares is the “colossus” of the 3rd Republic.
The names of the speakers remain, all magnificent: Duarte Azinheira, José Manuel dos Santos, João Soares, Teresa Patrício de Gouveia, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.
And the questions: how is it possible that all that will remain in the media is a Sibylline message from the President of the Republic to the leader of the PS? And that what was a notable lesson of our Contemporary History was not transmitted (as I believe)?
At least, it seems that Gulbenkian has everything recorded and can be released.
THE MEAN MADNESS
CLIMÁXIMO smeared the walls of the Castle of S. Jorge with red paint, with a biologist linked to this association of vandals who reminds me of the Taliban, stating to justify it that “castles are something that everyone wants to preserve, but what good are they? historical monuments, if we allow humanity to pass into history?”
Interestingly, with the exception of SIC Notícias and NiT – New in Town (which spoke of “vandalism”, honor be to them) the Portuguese media opted for the neutral “pintam Castelo de S. Jorge” in news that assumes this type of actions as natural .
Unfortunately, the madness is much more due to the media (objectively complicit) than to the vandals.
