This Tuesday, the Spanish Constitutional Court has prevented the Catalan cultural organization Òmnium Cultural from appearing in the case of the 25% Spanish language quota which was judicially decreed to be applied in Catalan schools. The guarantee court considers that Òmnium cannot enter into this procedure because it was not a party to the earlier judicial procedure that took place at the Catalan High Court (TSJC), before the matter was elevated to Constitutional Court level on appeal as the legal battle continues. The Spanish court of guarantees also notes in today's ruling that the body had already sought to appear at the TSJC, and that this was rejected by the court, initially last June, and for a second time in November.
The major pro-independence cultural entity, presided over by Xavier Antich, asserts that it is defending some 42 families who ask for Catalan to be maintained as vehicular language, in addition to defending the language of Catalonia itself in the territory's education system. The execution of the ruling imposing a 25% quota of classroom time in Spanish in all Catalan educational centres was suspended by the TSJC itself when it found that it could not be applied in the face of the new regulations passed by the Catalan Parliament and government.
In Òmnium's appeal at that time to the TSJC, the organization asserted that the promotion of Catalan is "a transversal issue for all aspects of society", especially youth, and, therefore, for the existing educational system in Catalonia. Although the TSJC expelled Òmnium from the case, the body announced that it would request to appear before the Constitutional Court, which has the task of ruling on the constitutionality of the laws approved by the Catalan government and Parliament to avoid the court's 25% Spanish order.
This Tuesday's meeting of the Constitutional Court in Madrid also featured the court's decision to admit an appeal against the Catalan law to confront the housing emergency. Specifically, the court accepted for consideration an appeal to revise the obligation on large property holders to offer "social" rents, that is, reduced rent levels for some homes. The Spanish government presented this appeal because it considered that this Catalan Parliament law violates state competencies.
As well, the Constitutional Court accepted an appeal by far-right Vox against the so-called 'Only yes means yes' law on sexual rights. According to the extremist party, this law is a "legal aberration" because it "violates all the basic principles of the legal system and the Constitution", according to the legal vice president of the party, Marta Castro. She affirmed that the law attacks the basic principles of legality, legal certainty and presumption of innocence, since, according to Vox, the new regulation of sexual consent, requiring an explicit "yes" from a partner, "inverts the burden of proof". One of the arguments used by the party led by Santiago Abascal is that the star law of equality minister Irene Montero leaves "victims unprotected" and allows a "very broad discretionary framework for analysis by the judge, in each case".