Pedro Sánchez highlights that the unemployment rate is already below 10%: 'That's responsible government'

The chief executive has defended in the Lower House of Parliament the need to reach agreements to combat the climate emergency and to prevent hatred, disinformation and violence on social networks.

Lower House of Parliament, Madrid

The President of the Government of Spain, Pedro Sánchez, during one of his speeches in the Government Control Session (Pool Congreso)

In the control session held in the Lower House, Pedro Sánchez affirmed that his government is responsible because it "assumes its responsibilities". In this regard, the president referred to his appearance in Parliament on the Adamuz accident, and to those of the Minister for Transport and Sustainable Mobility, Óscar Puente, in the Lower House and the Upper House on the same issue. "A responsible government shows its face, as this one does," he said in his reply to the PP parliamentary group's Alberto Núñez Feijóo.

The chief executive maintained that responsibility is also demonstrated by deeds and by the results of the policies carried out. "For the first time in 17 years we have an unemployment rate below 10%. We have 22 and a half million employed people. And 40% of the jobs created in Europe are created in our country", he said.

A responsible government is also one that proposes "future horizons that are key for security and prosperity", said Sánchez, who mentioned two of these proposals: an agreement on the climate emergency and legislating on social networks "to put an end to hatred, fake news, disinformation and violence".

Protecting children from violence, disinformation and hatred

The President of the Government of Spain, Pedro Sánchez, during one of his speeches in the Government Control Session| Pool Congreso

During his speech, Pedro Sánchez also argued that the protection of minors from violence, disinformation and hatred is not related to ideological issues, but to the way in which "democracy and coexistence in our society are conceived".

The president defended that it is not censorship to tell the techno-oligarchs that if they do not remove information that is untrue and generates hatred and violence, then they must face the consequences: "What ideology is behind it if it is not the defence of the general interest, to demand from these techno-oligarchs that algorithms do not facilitate the spread of fake news and disinformation, violence and pornography?"

The chief executive responded to Santiago Abascal, a member of the Vox parliamentary group, who linked the announcements to limit the access of minors to social networks and the regularisation of half a million immigrants. "Where is the problem in telling the social networks, these techno-oligarchs, not to make money from the mental health of citizens, and particularly that of young people"?

The president also said that regularising the status of immigrants has been a recurrent issue throughout Spain's more than 40 years of democracy, recalling that the main opposition party did likewise. Pedro Sánchez also referred to the events in Minnesota, in the US, pointing out that the security problem is not generated by the minors being deported by the US administration: "It is precisely the techno-oligarchs that create insecurity".

Non official translation

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Tags:

• Government of Spain
• Employment
• Climate change
• Economy