Mariano Rajoy urges Catalan business leaders to "restore the confidence that has recently been lost"

Foment del Treball Nacional, Barcelona

After congratulating the prize-winners on their deserved recognition, the President of the Government thanked the Catalan business leaders and trade unions for their contribution to ensuring that Catalonia recovers normality and returns to "the path of stability, foreseeability and legal certainty", and also of co-existence and dialogue".

Mariano Rajoy highlighted the role that business leaders must play from now on. "In the immediate future, you are called on to play a very important role in restoring the confidence that has been lost in recent times. Without confidence, as you know all too well, no investments are made, no new jobs are created and hence there is no future".

Re-establish self-rule in Catalonia

Mariano Rajoy underlined that talking about Catalonia is synonymous with entrepreneurship, innovation, the future, a global vision and progress. All of this, he added, "has made Catalonia an enviable benchmark admired around the world". However, "this is precisely what has been diminished and withered away in recent years" due to the events of recent weeks.

President of the Government Rajoy highlighted that "with the instruments that the rule of law makes available to the authorities", "the constitutional order that was under threat" has been swiftly restored and we have seen a return "to normal civic life". In terms of the future, we are "fully committed" to also returning "economic life in Catalonia to its former thriving glory". He explained that this has all been carried out "prudently, proportionally and with restraint".

Mariano Rajoy stressed that the ultimate goal is none other than "re-establishing full self-rule in Catalonia as soon as possible, and bringing to an end a period of instability, uncertainty and insecurity".

Article 155, an exceptional mechanism

On this point, the President of the Government explained that, although "we didn't want things to reach this point", Article 155 of the Spanish Constitution was triggered "to comply with our duty to society" because "our obligation is not only to ensure the law is upheld, but also to defend the rights of everyone and the well-being of society as a whole".

In this regard, he insisted that "the Government of Spain has applied an exceptional mechanism to tackle an exceptional situation and to open up a new political horizon in Catalonia".

Support from Government of Spain

The President of the Government underlined that the main challenge to recovering normality will take place after the elections on 21 December, because it will be then that "it will be down to all of us to do whatever is in our hands to ensure that the confidence in Catalonia once again inspires international investors, consumers and companies in other parts of Spain and throughout the world".

In this regard, Mariano Rajoy stressed that "the drive and excellence of business leaders in Catalonia will be decisive in this task" and will always be able to count on the Government of Spain to this end. "The people of Catalonia will never lack, neither now, nor in the future, the support of the Government of Spain". On this point, the President of the Government once again called for companies not to leave Catalonia. "You contribute to healing the wounds, to backing the region and to boosting confidence".

Economic growth

The President of the Government also referred to the "almost four years of exceptional economic growth and job creation since 2014. Since the first quarter of that year until now, almost 2.1 million jobs have been created in Spain, including 356,000 in Catalonia. He also added that "our economy has recovered the strength and vigour we enjoyed prior to the year 2008, which has lead it to become the developed economy to enjoy the fastest rate of growth".

Mariano Rajoy also claimed that although the government has been forced to lower the economic growth forecast due to "the political situation", if normality is recovered in Catalonia, the Spanish economy may grow by around 2.8% in 2018, and even hit the figure of 3%. "The key will be in returning to institutional and political normality" and "in recovering the ambition to overcoming challenges together", he clarified.

Mariano Rajoy also remarked that "the digital revolution is speeding up our socio-economic dynamic" and Catalonia has "the necessary elements" to "head up these transformations". Specifically, Barcelona, "with its open and innovative culture", has "an important entrepreneurial eco-system and is called on to play a leading role in this panorama", he explained.

Optimistic future

Furthermore, President of the Government Rajoy stated that we are forced "to look for new goals and targets" and "recover the ambition of building our country", not "through independence that impoverishes and isolates, but through the wealth and successes that unity and our membership of Europe offer us".

At any event, the President of the Government expressed his optimism in the future, "I trust in the capabilities of the Catalan people to head up a far-reaching rectification of the deviation we have seen, to foster a return to reality and co-existence, to re-direct all the energy wasted in now dealing with the day-to-day problems of people".

Following the elections in December in Catalonia, the President of the Government expressed his interest in speaking with everyone because "regardless of the outcome from the ballot boxes, I will continue to be the President of the Government of everyone". He added that "in the same way, I will demand everyone to respect the framework that the Constitution and the law impose", and "I will do this with conviction because I believe in the benefits of liberty, its fruitfulness and that Catalonia will soon return to what it was".

Non official translation