The head of the list of Teruel Existe to the Congress for the general elections of November 29, Tomás Guitarte, has made known this Friday the party's electoral program, a proposal that places the defense and reinforcement of public services at its center.
As he explained, "The first point is a change of course. We cannot constantly be talking about territorial problems, like the Empty Spain, depopulation, and other similar phenomena, without adopting policies that make it possible to change that situation. That is why we propose a balanced development policy".
He emphasized that "This affects Teruel, but also the whole of Aragon, which has similar problems. It's not a matter of forgetting the centralism of the large cities, but of trying to correct it, understanding that the model we have to move toward is another: one that provides opportunities to all territories and to all the people who live in them", Guitarte said.
In this regard, he stressed that "The second point is that we are not willing for Teruel to be a sacrifice territory for our people, who are forced to emigrate, and for our natural resources, which are exploited without this having repercussions in the territory's favor".
He added that "We can agree that renewable energies are developed, as long as they are located in the right places and there is prior planning and, likewise, we can view favorably projects of another type, such as the famous data centers that are mentioned so much now, but everything requires prior planning that determines where they can be installed, where they harm and where they do not".
Guitarte made it clear that "what we are not willing to accept is that our best landscapes, our mountains, and our main natural resources are sacrificed for the sake of not knowing what, because, on many occasions, these projects do not provide any benefit to the territory".
With regard to the establishment of new companies, he insisted that "Our first demand to all those companies that want to set up here or that propose to do so is that there be a real commitment to the development of the territory" because "you cannot come only to extract the resources that the province has", but rather "you have to commit to its development as well".
This implies, he has said, “to bet on giving participation to local communities in the projects”. In his view, “In Spain, renewable energies do not contribute sufficiently to territorial development through the participation of municipalities, districts, and provincial councils”.
Specific financing and strengthening of the FITE
On the economic front, he has detailed that “The third point, very closely linked to the previous one, is fair financing for Teruel”, which includes measures such as operating grants. “We achieved, through the investiture agreements, that they were finally implemented. However, they were established with amounts that were absolutely insignificant in order to achieve the effects that we intended. Therefore, they must be increased”.
He has also demanded that “The FITE should also be increased up to 100 million euros. This is something that we already had negotiated with the Government. When Mr. Azcón credits himself for having achieved that the FITE went from 60 to 86 million, it is necessary to remember that we had already negotiated that it reach 100 million. It was very easy to get there and say that it should be raised to that amount”.
Guitarte has clarified that “We are not just talking about transferring the increase in the CPI, which would mean placing it at around 80 million. We require that it reaches 100 million, but, above all, we want that this increase not be used afterward to cover the Government of Aragón’s ordinary spending, but rather that it truly fulfills its purpose: to finance investments in strategic, development and innovative projects, which normally would not be carried out through ordinary financing mechanisms”.
Public services, infrastructure, and connecting the territory
Another focus of the program is “The fourth point is the quality of public services, which we defend with all our strength: healthcare, education, and care for dependency. And we defend them because they are the only services that are present in the territory and that reach all places. Here it is very difficult for private healthcare to arrive or for private education to be established”.
Along these lines, he has emphasized that “Therefore, it is the public sector that must reach the degree of excellence that our society needs to guarantee development opportunities for everyone. We are going to be very combative in defending social services, dependency, and all public services”.
For Guitarte, "it is a transcendental matter and one of the identifying marks that define us: the unrelenting fight to improve public services in the territory".
As for communications, he has recalled that "The fifth point is infrastructures" since "the problem of Teruel has always been known and has been demonstrated, even scientifically: its origin lies in isolation from the major state communication networks".
He has explained that this lack of connections "is what has caused the difficulties for the development of our province: We need to develop the A-68, the A-40 and the A-25, as well as the inland Mediterranean corridor, which would connect the province from Teruel to Alcañiz".
Meanwhile, he added that "in addition, infrastructure also needs to be improved, such as the N-330 road as it passes through Teruel, and to tackle that kind of actions", considering the candidate of Teruel Existe.
Agricultural sector and defense of the countryside
The program devotes a specific block to the rural world: "The sixth point is the countryside, that is, agriculture and livestock farming. The countryside is the network that supports our towns and our territory. We cannot neglect it or allow it to happen again that a kind of uberization of the countryside occurs, with the arrival of large investment funds that destroy the family economy. We are betting on family agriculture and family livestock farming".
In the specific case of the province, Guitarte has raised an immediate demand: "In particular, for Teruel we propose an immediate measure: that the PAC that the farmers of Teruel receive be the same as what those in neighboring provinces receive. We cannot allow that, for example, the same owner—sometimes even in the same holding or on practically equal land—receives one PAC in the province of Teruel and a higher one in the province of Zaragoza. These are injustices that need to be corrected," he concluded.