The Catalan Minister of the Interior, Joan Ignasi Elena (ERC), is at the center of the controversy, and not because of dubious police action. Junts has targeted the Government of Pere Aragonès following linking immigration and crime and demanding the powers of immigration management from the Executive of Pedro Sánchez. Elena (Barcelona, 1968) is categorical: “There is no relationship between crime and origin.” Relying on judicial data, and avoiding police data at all times, he insists that the left must rearm itself and combat speeches “typical of the extreme right.”
Ask. Does the Generalitat, like Junts, want the powers to be able to expel repeat immigrants?
Answer. The Generalitat wants all the powers to exercise our powers with a State vocation and, therefore, also those of immigration policies. It is very good to talk regarding security, immigration, education, health, but I consider that mixing them is ideologically counterproductive and, furthermore, is false. This discourse must be fought.
P. Is there a relationship between immigration and crime?
R. There is a relationship between citizens and crime, but not between crime and its origin. I think they are fallacies that must be combated with data. One of the problems of the left is that it has renounced ideological combat too many times. I think that when the extreme right takes two steps, you have to stand up and take two steps forward. The relationship established between immigration and crime and insecurity is false. The data is testimony, 0.2% of immigrants are the prison population in Catalonia. When I talk regarding immigration I want to talk regarding the 99.8% of citizens who come from other countries. Of this 0.2%, 20% reoffend. In those who were born here, also 20%. We are at the same numbers. 10 years ago it was 30% of repeat offenders and in France it is 40%. As a country, things are not going that badly.
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P. You talk regarding judicial data, police data paint a different picture. Police officers link crime and immigration. Do some agents fuel racist discourse?
R. In Catalonia there are 1.3 million immigrants, of which 50% contribute, work, and 1% receive a retirement pension in Spain. What immigrants come to Catalonia and Spain to do is work. We as police treat and pursue crime, not the origin of criminals. I want to insist on this fallacy. In recent years, Catalonia has increased its active population exponentially: there are 3.7 million Catalans who work. 10 years ago 600,000 fewer people worked. With the current birth rate, who is guaranteeing this economic growth? The group of workers, among whom are immigrant people. We have to talk regarding immigration, but not in the terms that the extreme right speaks.
P. Does Junts use extreme right postulates?
R. No. What Junts has done is a political error, trying to stop a possible loss of votes in favor of the Aliança Catalana, the party of Mrs. [Silvia] Orriols, with the logic proposed by the adversaries. An attempt is made to stop the extreme right by placing its discourse at the political center. I think Junts is not a xenophobic party, but it tries to combat it by shooting itself in the foot.
P. Jordi Turull said that they will attack multi-recurrence migration “whether it takes 15 days or 8 generations” in Catalonia. How many generations does it take to be considered Catalan?
R. It is a wrong approach. For me, Catalan is everything that is here.
P. Are they so afraid of the electoral results of the mayoress of Ripoll, Sílvia Orriols, and her party Aliança Catalana?
R. It doesn’t scare me. I am on the left and I fight his speech, which is false and perverse.
P. Has Junts’ request for immigration powers to the Government of Pedro Sánchez been an ambush without ERC knowing?
R. There is a certain nebula regarding what has been negotiated, they have to explain it. Powers have to be negotiated with fine print and with specific agreements.
P. Do the Mossos have the capacity to assume a jurisdiction such as immigration?
R. Of course. We are growing and will reach 22,000 agents. And naturally we want them with resources.
P. Some police unions and the extreme right accuse him of not speaking openly regarding the fact that immigrants make up 16% of the population and 60% of those detained.
R. I completely reject the accusations of the extreme right regarding immigration because they are false. If we have 1.3 million immigrants and half are working and they are only 0.2% of the prison population and when they leave only 20% reoffend, we cannot affirm that the problem of insecurity is immigration. The problem of insecurity in Catalonia is many; a very serious one is called recidivism and the poor regulation of the criminal type of recidivism.
P. What is the profile of the multiple repeat offender?
R. It depends on the area, the time and the type of crime. The robot portrait is a man who commits many crimes, is arrested many times by the Mossos and does not go to prison. I recommend a legislative change that makes the reasons for entering prison for multiple recidivism more clear and a streamlining of trials.
P. It is an entrenched debate, there have been legal reforms and it is not achieved. What specifically do you propose?
R. That the accumulation of certain crimes generates penalties that involve imprisonment. In Barcelona there are people who are arrested 50 times in a year and accumulate more than 100 police records. This can not be. It has to be modified and I don’t care where this person is from.
P. Has xenophobia increased in Catalonia?
R. Far-right messages have increased. It happens in the European context. The alternative is the ideological rearmament of the left in its discourse and the political courage to say that security is more equality, more social justice and also more police, a closer and more technical police.
P. But the reality is that citizens have a series of concerns, also with immigration.
R. The alternative is more security, pedagogy, saying things by their name. That means saying that what Mrs. Silvia Orriols says is a lie, that the security problem is not immigration, but that there are many, and that immigration has brought many positive things. That security is an essential public service, a national priority, we should not be afraid to say that the country lacks more police officers… Talk, but not in the mental framework of those who limit themselves to saying that immigration is a problem for pit one part of the population once morest the other.
P. Does the return of Carles Puigdemont worry you? Do you have the return planned as Minister of the Interior?
R. When I return, I will feel satisfaction because the exile will be over. If we have managed international summits and the America’s Cup, we have the capacity to manage its return, the only thing missing is. The relevant thing will be that he will no longer be exiled.
P. It has been 10 years since you left the PSC due to the sovereignty consultation. Would you be in a Government that proposed a non-agreed referendum and a unilateral declaration of independence?
R. We are not in this scenario, I cannot consider it, it is not the path that the majority of the independence movement has set. What I am sure of is that we will see a referendum and that it will be yes.
P. Who will be ERC’s enemy in the next regional elections?
R. Our electoral adversary is the PSC, not Junts.
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