Spain’s labor minister launches new political movement

Spain’s popular Labor Minister Yolanda Diaz launched a new left-wing political movement on Friday ahead of general elections expected at the end of 2023, promising a new way of doing politics.

Diaz said she would go on a nationwide listening tour to gather ideas about what people want for the country and then decide whether it would participate in the next polls with her at the helm.

“In this civil movement I am just another part. They are the protagonists and if you want, I will rise,” she told around 5,000 people gathered at a Madrid cultural center.

Diaz said the new movement, called “Sumar,” which means “add” in Spanish, will seek “a new social contract” and work to end the politics of “confrontation.”

Politics should be about “reaching out a hand and then making agreements that change people’s lives,” she added.

Diaz currently represents the far-left Podemos party, the junior partner in the minority coalition government of Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.

According to polls, she is the most popular politician in Spain.

As Labor Minister, she was responsible for a recent labor reform credited with a sharp decline in the number of fixed-term contracts.

At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, she also oversaw a generous working holiday scheme that kept people earning an income even when large parts of the economy were closed due to lockdowns.

The launch of the new political movement comes as both the Socialists and Podemos have plummeted in the polls, while Spain, like across Europe, is plagued by high inflation.

The main opposition conservative People’s Party (PP) has overtaken the Socialists as Spain’s most popular party, according to a poll published in the daily El Pais on Monday.

The PP, which elected a moderate new leader in April, had 27.4 percent support, ahead of the Socialists at 26.3 percent.

Podemos was fourth behind far-right party Vox.

The PP secured a landslide victory in regional elections in Andalusia last month, winning an outright majority of seats in the former socialist stronghold.

For the first time, it will govern the southern region alone, Spain’s most populous region.