None of it was true and, most stunning of all, there are even those who are naively surprised. The Spanish prime minister's promise wasn't one, nor were the self-interested media leaks about a gesture from Pedro Sánchez towards the Catalan people in the budget real, nor was PSOE going to fulfill the Statute of Autonomy and its third additional provision, the one that says that for seven years the Spanish government investment in Catalan infrastructure would be equivalent to Catalonia's contribution to Spanish GDP, something which only happened once. So what was it all about, insisting that this year they really would? It must be that there's always someone in the decision-making roles who tends to think that, in the end, the Catalans will accept.
The real numbers, now we've seen the details of the public accounts, improve on previous years, but are far from being what they said they would be. It would almost seem an invitation to Catalan independence supporters to say no, if it weren't the case that, in the middle of the zeal in Madrid, some were tempted to run to support them. This breach should be added to another historical one in the budget year after year: the discrepancy between the number that appears in the official papers and the quantity that is finally received, once the corresponding process of bidding and adjudication has happened. At each step, such a quantity of millions ends up falling by the wayside that in recent years only 56% of budgeted infrastructure investment has been carried out. I mean, that's a joke.
That's why it's surprising (or not) that the Chamber of Commerce should be so enthusiastic about the final figures, especially taking into account the experiences of broken promises built up. Very different to the attitude of employer's association Cecot, which has expressed regret that investment in infrastructure should remain low. Both bodies know about numbers, although it seems that the first, immersed in an internal election process, would prefer to leave the Catalan government alone and seek refuge in Madrid and PSOE. For that reason it wasn't strange that the outgoing president, Miquel Valls, should have accompanied Pedro Sánchez last Saturday to the party's event proclaiming Jaume Collboni as its candidate for mayor of Barcelona.
All in all, numbers which, now we know them and taking into account the blockage of the political situation and the absence of governmental initiatives with regards to a referendum, the dialogue table, the political prisoners and the exiles, shouldn't go anywhere.