The former leader of the PCE has made Sánchez ugly with his long speeches during the two days of debate
“That you come with a bill of 20 pages…“, Ramón Tamames interrupted him on Tuesday a Pedro Sanchez. The Vox candidate for the motion of no confidence had been sitting on a bench in the chamber for almost four hours. Of them, one hour and 46 minutes listening to the President of the Government. The president of the Congress, Meritxell Batet, told him to shut up. Sánchez was missing 50 minutes of speech. “The President of the Government has just finished his first intervention and it has been an hour and 40 minutes. That means that we have all the time in the world ahead of us,” continued Tamames, who seemed to have a stopwatch in hand. The former leader of the PCE criticized the duration of Sánchez’s intervention and, in part, he was right. The leader of PSOE He has been the president who has spoken the most in a motion of no confidence; Tamames, the least likely candidate.
Between Tuesday and Wednesday, Sánchez had the use of the floor during two hours and 47 minutes, well above the rest of the other three chief executive who have been censored throughout democracy. The figures of the current president of the Government are very far from the hour and 22 minutes that Felipe González used, in 1987, to defend his government from the initiative registered by the leader of Alianza Popular Antonio Hernández Mancha. And also above the hour and 34 minutes that Adolfo Suárez used in 1980 against González.
In the two motions faced by the former President of the Government, Mariano Rajoy, the times he used to refute the candidates (in 2017 against Pablo Iglesias and in 2018 against Sánchez) were also similar: one hour and 44 minutes on the first occasion and one hour and 41 minutes in the second. Only Sánchez’s speeches have exceeded two hours in length. In 2020, he allocated two hours and 16 minutes to refute Santiago Abascal and on this occasion two hours and 47 minutes. It is true that Sánchez is the only one who has not only responded to the candidate, but also to the proponents, something that another member of the Government usually does.
Iglesias, the most talkative
Tamames acknowledged from Abascal’s seat that he had “cut” his speech. From the text that Vox sent to the journalists to the words that the former PCE leader pronounced, there was a lot of difference and deleted entire sections. His final time at the microphone was one hour and 46 minutes, almost less than half of what any of the other five candidates who have led a motion of no confidence in democracy spoke. The next shortest was Sánchez in 2018 (three hours and 22 minutes), followed by Hernández Mancha in 1987 (three hours and 26 minutes).
Bordering on almost four hours, Felipe González in 1980 dedicated three hours and 49 minutes to try to get Suarez out of Moncloa. However, the most talkative as candidates for the head of state have been Sánchez (four hours and 24 minutes in 2018 against Rajoy) and Iglesias (five hours and 44 minutes in 2017 against Sánchez). “Why do we have to talk so much, Madam President, I wonder, because it ends up being repetitive, the same thing all the time, and we don’t end up pronouncing ourselves on the issues,” Tamames inquired and asked for a change in the regulations to limit such rants .
