The Deputy Secretary of Institutional Regeneration of the PP, Cuca Gamarra, has criticized that the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has let the entire current legislature pass without submitting to a Debate on the State of the Nation —the last one was held in July 2022— and, furthermore, has breached his own commitment to convene "annually" that event in Congress. In her opinion, this reveals his "hypocrisy".
Alberto Núñez Feijóo's team has been insistently demanding during this legislature the holding of the State of the Nation Debate, one of the measures included in the PP's institutional quality plan that was unveiled in January 2023 in Cádiz.
In that vein, the PP brought to the Plenary Session of Congress in April 2025 an initiative to modify the regulations of the Lower House with the aim of establishing its annual celebration by norm and thus force Pedro Sánchez to convene it. Although the Plenary Session accepted to process the proposal, the text has since remained in the amendment phase.
The Debate of the Nation is an event created by Felipe González in 1983 and already totals 26 editions. Until 2015 it was held every year in which there was no investiture, but from then on, between electoral repetitions, failed investiture attempts and no-confidence motions, seven years passed until it was organized again.
Only one debate in the years of Sánchez
The last general policy debate took place in July 2022 and, in addition to the dialectical confrontations of Pedro Sánchez with the spokespersons of the different groups, a third day was held to vote on around a hundred resolution proposals.
"In Sánchez's eight years there has only been one State of the Nation Debate," Cuca Gamarra told Europa Press, who stressed that the Prime Minister has "the capacity to propose that debate and if he doesn't do it, it's because he doesn't feel like it."
Gamarra maintains that the "height of shamelessness" is that the Executive itself announced the "mandatory nature" of that annual meeting in September of the year 2024, when it presented its Action Plan for Democracy in the Council of Ministers, and that, despite this, it still has not convened it. "It is hypocrisy and a mockery," he/she stressed.
Said plan of the Government includes the obligation to hold each year the Debate on the State of the Nation, which will imply "a reform of the Regulations of the Cortes Generales", according to what explained then the Minister of the Presidency, Justice and Relations with the Cortes, Félix Bolaños.
Criticisms of the lack of majority and control
Gamarra argues that Sánchez avoids that debate for "pure survival", because his "lack of project for Spain" and "the corruption that corners him" would be exposed. He also considers that it would be evident that he leads "an absolutely divided Government", something that, as he has stressed, was perceived ten days ago in the Council of Ministers that approved the anti-crisis decree due to the Iran war.
In third place, he/she has warned that in that debate —in which the resolutions presented by the groups are put to a vote— his/her lack of parliamentary majority would be "perfectly portrayed". "White and in a bottle", he/she added.
The former general secretary of the PP maintains that Sánchez's attitude demonstrates "his lack of democratic habits" and has recalled that "he already said he would govern without Parliament, but not only without the capacity to legislate but to submit to minimum control."
Gamarra, responsible for the coordination of the Democratic Regeneration Plan that the PP promises to apply if Feijóo reaches Moncloa, reproaches Sánchez for having dedicated himself to "erasing" and "trampling" democratic practices respected by previous presidents. In her view, that drift has led to proposing that these uses become "mandatory" so that they do not disappear again in the future.
In addition to the Debate on the State of the Nation, Gamarra has advanced that, if the PP governs, it will also be "obligatory" for the Executive to have to "render accounts" on the degree of compliance with the propositions and motions approved by the Cortes, so that they do not remain in "a limbo".
Government's Response: boasts of parliamentary control
Following a written question from the PP in Congress about why the Government did not request to convene a general policy debate in 2025, the Executive responded that "rigorously complies with the constitutional obligation to submit to parliamentary control through each and every one of the mechanisms" provided for by the Constitution "in its Title V, dedicated to the relations between the Government and the Cortes Generales".
In that reply, to which Europa Press has had access, the Government recalls that Sánchez has appeared in Plenary on a dozen occasions and the ministers "on 45", "in addition to 151 appearances in committees of both Chambers". To this, it adds the oral questions that are addressed in each control session, the interpellations and the written questions that are registered daily "in exercise of the permanent oversight of the Executive's actions".