The Spanish Alliance Against Poverty gathered representatives from three main political parties in Spain – PSOE, PP and IU- to discuss their electoral proposals to address international poverty and inequality, before the upcoming general elections on March 9. During the debate the political representatives and the pubic talked about cooperation, trade and immigration policies.

The questions of the Spanish Alliance Against Poverty-a civil society platform formed by trade unions, NGOs and environmental organizations, youth, women, and citizens’ groups, representing more than 1,000 social organizations- focused on the political commitments to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, the need to improve and increase official development assistance, tackling external debt and ensuring a fair trade system for all countries.

At the debate, and following the Alliance’s demands, the three political representatives agreed to consider the quality of aid as the key issue for the next legislative period, especially given that all parties have committed to allocate 0.7% of GNP to official development assistance by 2012.

The Alliance also called for concrete steps to address the lack of coherence between European policies on migration and international trade and the principles of equitable and sustainable development. Initiatives such as the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs), promoted by the EU and rejected by African countries a recent summit in Lisbon, have failed to adequately create consistency and cohesion between development policy and trade policy.

On the debt release front, the debate focused on the FAD credits, one of the existing mechanisms generating debt in Spain — managed until now by the Ministry of Economy. The three political representatives were in favour of reforming this system: for the IU representative, this reform was one of its legislative priorities for the next years and the PSOE delegate supports a policy that would no longer count FAD credits as ODA. The PP proposed continued support for debt swap: a practice where debt is cancelled in exchange for social investment in education by the debtor nation.

Finally, the Spanish Alliance Against Poverty asked political parties about the creation of the State Board for Social Corporate Responsibility. The wanted more information on how this institution will influence Spanish multinationals abroad and ensure decent work and respect for human rights. All the parties agreed on the importance of this regulatory Council. IU also considered necessary a Corporate Social Responsibility Law.