Vote on Catalan's official status in EU postponed 

Tuesday’s scheduled vote on the official status of the Catalan language has been postponed due to the lack of unanimous support by all 27 member states in the General Affairs Council in the EU.

According to the Catalan News Agency (ACN), at least ten member states had pushed Spain to withdraw the matter from Tuesday's agenda over legal and economic doubts.

When the meeting got underway, some of the first speakers to address making Catalan, Basque, and Galician official languages asked the Spanish government to withdraw the issue from Tuesday’s agenda to clarify the legal and economic doubts that some member states still have on the matter. 

Until the very last moment, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez had tried to pressure his European colleagues to include the languages in the EU, but so far, to no avail.

The seven countries that asked Spain to postpone the vote to keep negotiating were Germany, Austria, Croatia, Italy, Sweden, the Czech Republic, and Finland.

The countries in favor of the Spanish initiative were Belgium, Slovenia, Portugal, and Romania.

The matter could be taken up on the next the next meeting of the General Affairs Council in the EU, scheduled for June 24.

Reactions to delay of vote

From his trip to Japan, Catalan president Salvador Illa reacted to the news of the delay of the vote with optimism, saying that he has “full confidence” that Catalan will one day become official.

“Today, we’re closer than ever,” he said. “Ten years from now, what we will remember is that thanks to the joint action of various administrations, we achieved Catalan as an official language in Europe. We won’t remember whether it happened a month earlier or later.  I believe this can be achieved.”

Illa also emphasized the importance of recognizing Catalan as a way to “strengthen the European project.”

Pro-independence ERC, on the other hand, blamed the Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE) for the delay. Deputy spokesperson Jordi Albert stated that the Socialists “can’t pretend to be surprised,” and added that there’s “still much work to do”.

Albert added that the Socialists should have “secured” the vote beforehand, and that now the party must back up their words with actions.

The Spanish government’s spokesperson, Pilar Alegría, assured that the executive will “continue working and negotiating” to achieve official status for the three co-official languages in Spain.

“We’ve made a lot of progress in the past weeks,” Alegría told the press, because “a large number of member states were willing to approve the proposal,” while only “a small number of countries have asked for more time and more information.”

At the same time, the spokesperson wouldn’t set a date but said that the government “from this moment on, will continue to engage in dialogue and work with the other countries to convince them as soon as possible.”

The Spanish foreign minister, José Manuel Albares, said to Catalan media on Tuesday that he would immediately get in touch with the seven countries that have been unwilling to vote on the matter, adding that the Spanish government is willing to “improve the wording” of the economic and judicial arguments to obtain unanimity.

Before the postponement, the conservative People’s Party of Catalonia (PPC) told the press that the project to make Catalan an official EU language was a “political operation” to “cover up the corruption of Spanish PM Pedro Sánchez."

When asked, party spokesperson Juan Fernández confirmed that the PPC had contacted member states where the European People’s Party (EPP) holds power in the EU parliament before the vote. Fernández stated, “There are always phone calls,” but added that the PPC “had not called anyone to tell them what to do.”

Harsh criticism of PP

The actions of the Spanish People’s Party (PP) and the PPC have received harsh criticism from political parties, including ERC, the Socialist, and Junts.

ERC accused the party of "Catalanophobia" for lobbying against the official status of the language.

The Spanish and Catalan socialists called the PP’s actions “antipatriotic” and “deplorable,” and criticized PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo, who is from Galicia, for “attacking his own language.”

Meanwhile, Former Catalan president, Carles Puigdemont, accused Núñez Feijóo of “conspiring with third countries” in a post on X (former Twitter), remarking ironically that “I don’t know if the PP is promoting disobedience or rebelion,” with reference to his own pending charging over the 2017 independence referendum.

The Catalan NGO Plataforma per la Llengua accused PP of “openly working against the Catalan language.” 

Concerns from member states

Before the meeting, Finland’s Joakim Strand assured that the question was not yet “ripe” to be voted on and that there are still “concerns.”

"There are still some concerns that have been lifted also by the Council's legal services, and I think that is something that we need to take very seriously," Strand told media outlets.

"I think that linguistic diversity is important, and we are always constructive, and we want to continue discussing," he concluded.

Before the meeting, Croatia stated it hoped to have a "fruitful negotiation."

Diplomatic sources report that the EU Member States are aware of the political investment led by Spain's PM, Pedro Sánchez, to see Catalan, Basque, and Galician official languages in the EU.

The Spanish government is pushing to make Catalan, Basque, and Galician official languages in Europe as it's part of the deal struck between the Socialist Party and Junts per Catalunya for the pro-independence group to support Pedro Sánchez's Prime Ministerial bid in 2023.

Spain's proposal needs unanimous support to be officially approved.

Listen to our podcast from October 2023 to learn more about the origins of the efforts to make Catalan an official European language.

Negotiating until last minute

Spain's foreign affairs minister, José Manuel Albares, defended the country's position and said that it would negotiate until the last minute to see Catalan, Basque, and Galician gain the official EU languages status.

"The debate is already on the agenda, and we are working with all member states," Albares said on Monday.

He pointed out that Spanish authorities have been working with some countries that had doubts, and that the proposal has been "worked hard and improved with the help of all states."

Spain's cabinet had proposed to adopt the official language status, but with a progressive implementation. "If it is greenlighted, the three languages can become official on Tuesday, but implementation can take time," foreign affairs ministry sources have said.

Spain's arguments

To convince the other member states, Spain shared documents with other governments in which it argued that the official status would not lead to a precedent for other minority or minoritized languages. For example, among the Baltic countries, the fear is that it will generate a precedent for Russian, while Cyprus is concerned about Turkish.

For this reason, Spain said the proposal is "tailor-made" for the specific cases of Catalan, Basque, and Galician.

Spain pointed out that the three languages have been official within Spain and recognized in the Spanish Constitution for decades, and that they can be used in the Congress and Senate, which is not the case with other minority languages ​​in the EU, such as Russian.

Spain has also said it will pay for the costs of making the languages official. A preliminary report from the European Commission estimated the cost at €132 million.

Catalan is also a widely spoken language. In some cases, its number of speakers exceeds that of other languages ​​that do have official status. With roughly 10 million speakers in the EU, Catalan would be the 13th most spoken in the bloc, ahead of English, Danish, Finnish, Swedish, or Irish.