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Today we will talk about banks again. It's always the banks. To save the financial
system, to build trust. And today we have a new decree meant to build trust.
A decree you will pass as you did the seventeen before this one. But I fear, and the events
give me reason, quoting Groucho Marx, we are going from victory to victory...
to God knows where. Yesterday, Mr. Minister, I heard you saying several times
the word "responsibility." And I, Mr. Minister, prefer to speak in my three minutes
just about that: responsibility. "Responsibility" has a double meaning,
which suits well the ones who are responsible of the fact that this
Parliament is speaking more about banks than citizens. So when we talk
about responsability and we look at the dictionary we see that a responsible person
is the one which takes care of his obligations or pays attention to
what he or she does or decides, that is, what the people that you, the parties, appointed
in the banks, Bancaja, CAM, Caja Madrid, Bankia and many others.
They were meant to be responsible, to fulfill their obligations, to take care and attention.
But in view of the decree we are discussing today, in view of the
substantial aid [the banks] have received, in view of the bailouts that the state has
had to undertake, it is a fact that all of you, the major political parties, appointed
truly irresponsible people to "cajas"[banks]. And so are there
irresponsible people at the head of the Control Authorities, be it the Bank of Spain or other
autonomous authorities. People, with a face and eyes, that were paid large amounts of salaries,
allowances or pensions. But responsibility has a second meaning:
"guilty of something, person meant to answer for something or someone." And nobody
takes care about this second meaning. Nobody wants to be guilty. No one
answers. Nobody is responsible for this colossal mess. And that's when the
ordinary citizen, that who is up there or who is watching us at home, understands
nothing. They cannot understand how a man can sink a bank, take fourteen
million [euros] yet have no responsibility. They cannot understand how a man, who
has been Finance Minister, chairman of the International Monetary Fund and
who has been appointed by you chairman of Bankia, how he can plunge a bank
resign and take a million-odd and yet he does not give a single explanation. They cannot understand why
you do not allow those people to come here, to the Parliament, to explain why
we have ended like this. They cannot understand why you are blocking the inquiry commission.
And they cannot understand why, as is stated in today's decree, we will give the
banks yet again more public state aid to clean up toxic assets. That is to say, in conclusion,
that in the end, we, the citizens, will have to help the banks again with out taxes.
Eventually, the citizens will be held responsible for the outrage committed by the
irresponsible. Mr. Minister, you and others probably found my speech
irresponsible. But far more irresponsible is running thick veils, lift the carpet and
hide the dust under it while evictions continue. While individuals and SMEs are
not provided with credit. Mr. Minister, do not count on our vote. Do not count on
Compromís-Equo's vote. Thank you, Mr. President.