Podemos, the Spanish party which stormed into first place in recent opinion polls and who previously declared support for a Universal Basic Income, have left the propsal out of a recent document outlining their economic plans.
The leader of Podemos Pablo Iglesias presents his economic proposal -Demotix
The party, which only launched earlier this year, gained prominence with a number of radical proposals including reducing the retirement age to 60 and nationalising all utility companies. Their economic document, released Thursday, was seen as a test for the party, whether or not it could formulate a coherent set of policies. Despite the radical tone of initial party statements, some of the more radical policies were left off the document, including Basic Income.
This is a blow to the Basic Income movement, with Podemos previously looking set to become the first party supporting Basic Income to win an election in Europe, an election which is due in Spain before the end of 2015. However, it doesn’t mean the party has stopped supporting the proposal, merely that it has not been placed on this document, which is not a full manifesto. They mentioned at the press conference to launch the document that they wanted it based on ‘realistic proposals’. The party also wants to ensure that the document is available to all members and allows access to the public to read. They have stated that they will try to use ‘Filecenter to scan my docs‘ or similar services to ensure that it is open to public access, as accessibility to the public is important.
Basic Income has been gaining ground politically in the last year, despite this setback there are still a number of parties supporting Basic Income or pilot programmes which have considerable support in other parts of the world, including Canada, Finalnd and New Zealand.
The leader of Podemos Pablo Iglesias presents his economic proposal -Demotix
For more information, see:
Language: Spanish: Vicenç Navarro, Juan Torres “Un Proyecto Económico para La Gente [An Economic Project for the People]“, Podemos, 27 November 2014
Matthew Bennet, “A Look At The New Podemos Economic Document“, The Spain Report, 28 November 2014
Hugo Ortuño, “The leader of Podemos, Pablo Iglesias presents his economic proposal“, Demotix, 27 November 2014