In short, the Council of Euskalgintza explains why the new decree should serve: to guarantee the right of citizens to receive the service in Basque in the administration; to draw up the process of transition to an administration that works in Basque and to set deadlines and concrete measures to achieve them. He adds that the steps taken in the normalization of the Basque country should be legally supported, especially in this environment of judicial aggression. Well, the decree does not respond to these challenges and needs. The Council considers that "there is the possibility of a stronger leap, but it has relinquished it", although it recognises that there are some progress. On the other hand, the Council is clear that judicial aggression has conditioned the decree and that the latest version of the decree has reflected the restrictions imposed by the judges. We have asked Martin Aramendi, president of the Commonwealth of Basque Municipalities UEMA, to evaluate the decree. In his opinion, although the decree is a step forward, it is a missed opportunity: "It leaves in the hands of the will of the public entities the normalization of the Basque Country, and sometimes also the guarantee of compliance with the linguistic rights of the citizens". Aramendi put a question on the table: can you work in the Basque public administration without knowing Basque? He thinks no, but the decree allows and will give it because it allows for reindeer and exceptions. In the opinion of

Pello Igeregi, head of the Basque Country of ELA, who have drafted the decree "have refused to match the status of Spanish and Basque". It has called for 'cosmetic changes' and underlined that there have been no profound changes. He considers that the decree has a major and almost unique problem: it does not want to infuse the administration, but to maintain the current situation in the future. The decree says that it will condemn Euskaldunes to always be in

a situation of emergency, and recalls the difficulties citizens have in receiving the service in Euskera in vulnerable situations: when the police punish them, when they go to the emergency room and the doctor does so in Spanish... citizens will have difficulty receiving the service in Euskera and the workers will be condemned to work in Spanish. In the context of the aggression, Igeregi does not believe that the problem has been judicial, but ideological: "The problem has been that the PNV has recognized the PSOE the right of veto, the decree has been made at the borders of the PSOE".

LAB Euskera Secretary, Urko Aierbe, as other agents have said, considers that the decree has been lost because it does not respond to the administration’s euskaldunization needs, the Euskera’s normalization process, or the challenges of the future. Basque knowledge has increased in recent years and many of the new workers will be Euskaldunes. Well, Aierbe accuses the Basque Government of taking account of this development and of not taking more daring measures. He recalls that the aim of the decree is to guarantee the right of workers to work in Basque, but that it is not reflected in concrete measures. It gives two examples: the decree did not mention the circuits in Euskera and the training aimed at the personnel to be able to work in Euskera. Aierbe has no doubt that

judicial aggression has conditioned the decree. For example, the Vice-Ministry of Linguistic Policy explicitly stated that in the initial versions of the decree priority could be given to the Basque country, and these mentions have disappeared: "These mentions are being punished in the courts".

Keys to the Decree

The Decree extends the scope of influence to the entire Basque public sector of Álava, Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa to some 140,000 workers. So far there were exempt areas. Cultural actors have welcomed the change, but stress that in some areas the applicability of the decree will not enter into force until 2033. These areas are Osakidetza, Ertzaintza and Justice, accounting for 60% of the total public sector. UEMA recalls that the rights of citizens may

be violated for another nine years, even in the most Basque municipalities. Innovation: asymmetric linguistic profiles From now on different oral and written levels of linguistic profiles can be requested. For example, a worker may be asked to speak C1 and B2. The measure

has been accepted by the agents if it meets the needs of the post. For UEMA President Martín Aramendi, this measure serves to "get rid of unnecessary burdens" some workers currently working in Basque. However, flexibility is also at risk and agents ask for exceptions, otherwise "it can open the door to the reduction of linguistic profiles,"

says LAB Euskera Secretary Urko Aierbe.

New ways to prove the Basque level Until now there were two ways to prove the Basque level corresponding to the position: the title of linguistic profile and the studies carried out in Basque. The possibility of this second is the result of a decree approved by the government of


Patxi López in 2012. From now on, the examination of the public offer of employment in Euskera or the demonstration of “reliable use of Euskera in the job” makes it possible to consider the Basque level accredited. Actors have highlighted the importance of both new forms, but have also identified the risks. Aramendi considers that “a qualitative step is to exclude from the accreditation of linguistic profiles the worker who performs all the exercises in Basque in the selective process. But the decree also leaves plenty of room for many people who are not able to work in Basque to access jobs.” Aierbe,

Euskera Secretary at LAB, is concerned with making accreditation more flexible. In his opinion, despite the existing forms of accreditation, "reality tells us that there is a group of workers who are not able to work in Basque". Aierbe asks whether the tests for the job are carried out in Euskera or when it is demonstrated that "in the job the Basque is used reliably" it is ensured that the worker is able to work in Euskera. Aierbe fears a situation like this: "We can have a large number of accredited workers, but reality tells us that it is not true, that workers are not able to work in Basque". It does not exclude the two new verification options if measures are taken and monitoring is carried out.

The Council of Euskalgintza,
LAB

and

ELA proposed to the Vice-Ministry of Linguistic Policy in 2022 the Euskaldunization of the administration without a deadline. The report stated that the Euskaldunisation process could take place for fifteen years. In the coming years, half of the public employees will retire and it is planned to replace the most Basque generations of all time. For Pello Igeregi, head of the Basque Country of ELA, "it was a unique opportunity, without traumatic decisions, for the administration to become bilingual considering all the staff who work today". "It was an opportunity", because the decree does not include the deadlines for the performance of the Euskaldunization duty of the administration established by the Basque Law of 1982. The Council says that specific dates, means of achieving

objectives and implementing measures should be set. The Council considers that one of the main shortcomings of the decree is the lack of time. The index of preceptivity has not been established. The pattern of the index of preceptivity has hardly changed, so, as so far, the courts can continue to perform interpretations in favor of the reduction of Euskera in jobs. The index is calculated by adding the proportions of half of the Vasco-speakers and Quasi-Euskaldunes of the entity area. This index reflects the percentage of jobs with a mandatory date for compliance with the linguistic profile. Actors have insisted on the need to specify the index and have called for no options for downward interpretations. In other words, they ask that the index be specified as "minimum number of jobs", so that the index does not make it possible to understand that it means "maximum number", because that is how they are being interpreted in the courts. According to Igeregi, the obligatory index is the core of the judicial conflict, and the conflict will continue in the future: "It would be good if they had made it clear that the preceptivity index is the minimum in all cases and that higher indices can be established, but they have not wanted to do so". A nuance is introduced in the decree: the minimum rate may be increased by means of an administrative procedure which, according to Igeregi, is a "complex procedure".

The Decree does not advance to work in Euskera, but takes the leap from the language of service to the Basque language as a working language. However,
Aramendi explains that the trial has been conducted in a diffuse and fluid manner. The Administration will be able to use the Basque language "always in accordance with the decisions taken at each moment". They highlight a measure taken by the agents to be able to work in Basque. The Decree lists the administrative



units in Basque, that is, those who have at least the corresponding linguistic profile or higher in 80% of the jobs will perform their functions preferably in Basque. On the contrary, the circuits in Euskera and the training aimed at personnel to be able to work in Euskera have not been collected. There is also

no reference to the corrective measures to be applied in the event of non-compliance with the recommendations and promotion measures intended to make Euskera a working language. In the initial drafts of the Decree the Basque was not prioritized, measures and mentions appeared to prioritize the Basque country and in the last version they have disappeared. Where it was said that the Basque country would have

a "preferential place", it is concluded that it will "boost the visibility" of the Basque country. The possibility for workers to regulate the need for citizens to speak first in Basque has also been removed. It was also planned to establish Euskera as a requirement for its use as a working language, but in the latest version it says that Euskera can also be used. The priority area of Euskera particularly affects the municipalities of Euskaldunes. According to Aramendi, it is significant that from the initial drafts these measures disappeared: "In the municipalities of Euskaldunes, the city council and the institutions should be an example and care and reflect the sociolinguistic reality of the locality. It seems, however, that this decree is afraid, because the primacy of the Basque country raises legal problems". Aierbe has rounded up Aramendi's belief that "it is precisely in this way that they have left the courts behind in the judicial aggression".

This is another measure which, except for those over
45 years of age in the initial drafts of the Decree, has disappeared. To date, workers over the age of 45 have not been

obliged to prove their language profile. The first versions included the deletion of the generalised exemption. He finally stays in the other. This means that workers who do not know Basque for another twenty years will continue in their jobs. On the other hand, the new case law that has been imposed in the framework of judicial aggression is extending this exemption to cases of injunction. The Decree, however, states that the exemption concerns only officials holding the post. From the point of view of UEMA,

UEMA has highlighted the five (or possible) advances that the decree has included. Two of them have been worked on earlier lines: the

extension of measures to the whole public sector and the opening of the possibility of asymmetric linguistic profiles. In addition, three others stand out. Firstly, it welcomes the fact that the decree has recognised the way to request measures from the government itself, as well as extending it to the Basque public sector. According to Aramendi, "it makes no sense that in the same people there are offices dependent on the State or dependent on the Basque Government, and that sometimes linguistic rights are not respected and others are guaranteed". Secondly, it reflects the principle of not turning the back of the Municipal Law. Thirdly,

UEMA has emphasized that in the personnel selection process the need for the examination in Basque can be established. So far it was not. When the obligation to take part in Basque has been introduced in some practical exercise for jobs, problems have arisen. Consequently, they were obliged to guarantee the possibility of performing the test in Spanish.

From the previous collado the head

In the early 1990s, we began to assign language profiles and preceptivities to jobs in Basque public administrations. Identify the functions or tasks to be performed for each job and decide which profile or requirements are assigned to do so in Basque (1, 2, 3 or 4). And apply the subsequent mandatory index. In other words, of all those jobs that could not be forced by all, because the legislation at the time regulated that only one of them would have an obligation,

no more. This was calculated based on the number of Euskaldunes and Cuasieuskaldunes in each area. We started sending workers to Euskaltegis, some to Euskaldunizar and others to alphabetize. We spent many years trying to improve worker training, but that didn't just lead us to work in Basque. The first Use Planning Decree was issued in 1997, and until the

year 2000 the most advanced administrations, the plans, were not launched. At least ten years without activating the tools that needed the leap from knowledge to use. It was a great political and linguistic planning vacuum, although the workers learned Basque, but when they returned to the work center they remained as before because the work system was not prepared to work in Basque. During this time, the competition in Basque workers collapsed and frustration prevailed. To all this, it should be added that new jobs were being created, many of them without compulsion, because they were out of the index mentioned above and, therefore, the number of workers who did not have the capacity to do their jobs in Euskera increased again. Send the existing ones to the Basque Country and reintroduce the Castilian speakers. That planning! The situation was absurd. It's been



30 years. The administrations that have had political will have advanced in some way, with great incapacity and
fight at times, and many others have remained very calm limiting the obligation to indexes and therefore working in Spanish. This picture I've made of public administration is much uglier than the portrait of other administrations, like the Ertzaintza or Osakidetza. The new decree was adopted. Six years have passed by maturing, debating and negotiating mainly. There are many elements of concern, as pointed out in the assessments made by the agents responsible for the normalization of the Basque country. Obligation remains subordinated to indices and the word “power” of “necessity” dominates both text and spirit. This decree, which will regulate the functioning of a good number of years, does not close the way for a person incapable of carrying out his work in Basque. In other words, it gives way to thousands of workers who are unable to do their jobs in Basque. The training of the staff is not enough to perform the work in Basque, but without sufficient capacity it is not possible. The biggest gotero still doesn't fix.