The Catalonian government is not ready to carry out cutbacks within its public companies, which are under its umbrella, despite the fact that the national government required it to make over 800 million in cutbacks in order to meet a 1.5% deficit goal.
But Catalonia can meet the requirements Madrid has imposed on it by reorganizing the Catalonian Audiovisual Media Corporation, which is the head of the group that merged TVE3 and Cataluña Radio in a way similar to what Valencia did when it cut 1.3 employees from the Canal Nou television station.
Catalonia's television, which boasts eight government-run channels, employs 2,642 people and is the wealthiest and biggest regional government television network in Spain. The Catalonian government budgeted 300 million to run the networks in 2011 and 260 million for 2012. In addition to this modest cutback, they have carried out wage cuts and closed down astronomically priced satellite transmissions.
But the heart of the problem hasn't been fixed, and that fix seems far away, because Catalonian President Artur Mas made it clear to Rajoy that it's impossible to make new cuts to his regional government's accounts without doing away with basic services and healthcare. In addition to these struggles, there is the language issue. For Mas, Catalonian public broadcasting is a tool for defending the use of Catalán in Spain and, therefore, ought to be left in his government's hands.
The disagreements have led Mas to make a court appeal in an effort to avoid the cutbacks imposed by the national government. What's happening in Catalonia reminds us of how regional governments aren't trying very hard to fulfill their promises.
