CataluÃ±a Autonomy?

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Javi S

I don't get your question. Catalunya is an autonomous comunity in spain. We call it an historical autonomous comunity since our culture is quite distinguished respect to the rest of the country. In Catalunya we are not forced to speak Catalan since everybody speaks Spanish. However, Catalan is compulsory in schools (i don't think that's negative). About taxes, it's not true that we pay less taxes since the taxes are still managed by the Spanish government and so we do have to pay the same taxes as in the rest of the country. About public services being better, i don't agree with that either. For example the suburban trains in Barcelona are still run by RENFE, which is the public Spanish company that operates the Spanish lines. During the last years we have had a lack on investment in railway infrastructures (basically all the money was spent on the high speed line Barcelona - Madrid) and this has led to a very poor service, with continuous delays, interruptions, etc. Pple in Catalunya are quite upset in this sense because some of the pple think that we would have better infra if the catalan government could manage it. Health services are OK but are quite overcrowded since Catalunya has had lot of inmigration during the last few years and they have not been able to build new hospitals at the same speed. I can tell you that Catalunya is one of the most prosperous comunities in economical terms which locates it in the leading regions in Europe. The industrial activity accounts for about the 25% of the total industrial activity in Spain. Tourism is also a big source of income in Catalunya.

extension:
Catalunya gets less money than we pay in taxes since part of the taxes we pay in Catalunya have to be redistributed to the poorest comunities. The Basque Country is a different thing. For historical reasons they are allowed to collect their taxes and then, every year, after negotiations with the spanish government they have to contribute to the Spanish coffers as part of Spain. This situation is better since who has de money, has the power.

Another negative point is that since Catalunya is a rich comunity and we get lots of tourism as well, we have higher inflation in prices of goods respect to the average in Spain. Although, the salaries in Catalunya are corrected according to the average inflation in Spain. That means that the salaries in Catalunya don't get evenly increased according to the increasing prices in Catalunya. Result: Over the years the purchasing power of pple living in Catalunya is decreasing considerably.

About corruption. There isn't more corruption in Catalunya than in any other part of Spain.

By 2006 a new statute of autonomy was voted. This new statute is still in process to be applied because one of the national parties appealed to the supreme court stating that some of the articles were not according to the Spanish constitution. When applied, this new statute will allow more competences and independence to the Catalan government.

I, Clavdivs

Forced to speak catalan? Oh, come on. Everybody speak in the language they want. They protect their language like in Ireland irish gaelic is official, with the difference that most of catalans speak catalan as their mother tongue.

SUE

I wasn't forced to speak CatalÃ¡n while in Barcelona. I was under the impression that the whole idea was to make it POSSIBLE and LEGAL to speak and teach CatalÃ¡n. That was a huge part of the move towards autonomy in the first place! (certainly not all of it, but the language piece.)

I didnÂ´t think there were many people in CataluÃ±a who didnÂ´t support autonomy.

The negatives are that the income that comes from one of the most prosperous parts of Spain no longer goes to the national coffers. The Central government is the part that is losing out, there, and that was the major objection during the days of Franco...the Central government couldnÂ´t afford to lose the income/taxes, etc. from the two most properous regions in Spain...CataluÃ±a and Pais Vasco.

I might be wrong on that, but those are the two most industrialized (historically) regions, and where most of the money always came from.

Mikhail

CATALUNA IS PART OF SPAIN BUT IT CAN BE INDEPENDENT TOO AS WELL

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