The socialist deputy elected for the Algarve Miguel Freitas told the Sul Informação have voted against the proposal to suspend the tolls, debated this Thursday in the Assembly of the Republic, for "coherence" with the positions previously taken by the PS.
"In today's vote, we have maintained our position since the beginning," guaranteed the Algarve parliamentarian, who is also president of the PS Algarve, stressing: "we don't have two faces, one in the government and the other in the opposition."
Therefore, he stressed, "it was out of political honesty that we maintained our position."
Even so, he admitted, «I consider that tolls are negative for the Algarve and I have always conditioned my position on the introduction of exemptions and discounts and also on works on the EN125». With regard to exemptions and discounts, Miguel Freitas considers that the ordinance of the PSD Government of Passos Coelho maintained what had already been proposed by the previous Government, of the socialist José Sócrates. "Therefore, no other position on our part made sense."
In any case, he guaranteed, the PS will present, "soon", a "legislative initiative to make the exemptions and discounts continue beyond June 2012", taking into account the delays in the works of the EN125.
"At the beginning of the year, we will put the issue very clearly to the Government", he assured.
The PCP's proposal to end the collection of tolls on the A22, A23, A24 and A25 highways, debated today and voted on in the Assembly of the Republic, was rejected with votes against by the PSD, CDS and PS.
Even so, in the PS there were six deputies who voted in favor of the communist proposal – Pedro Alves, André Figueiredo, Fernando Serrasqueiro, Rui Santos, Glória Araújo and Hortense Martins – and two abstentions – Elza Pais and Acácio Pinto.
However, of the deputies elected by the Algarve, only deputies Paulo Sá (PCP, and one of those responsible for the communists' proposal) and Cecília Honório (Left Block) voted for the suspension of the tolls.
The Algarve deputies of the PSD (Mendes Bota, Pedro Roque, Elsa Cordeiro, Cristóvão Norte), PS (Miguel Freitas only, since João Soares was not even present in Parliament at the time of voting) and CDS-PP (Artur Rego) voted against the suspension of tolls.
Artur Rego, from the CDS, even intervened in the AR in favor of the tolls, while Mendes Bota (PSD) voted in favor, due to party discipline, but presented an explanation of vote, which has not yet been released.
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