Some thoughts on the Catalan referendum law

1) Yes, hundreds of city councils have pledged support to this referendum. But the most populated cities have refused to do so. We are talking about 3 of the 4 province capitals. 7 from 10 of the most populated cities have refused so far to comply with the referendum law (because it is suspended by the Constitutional Court): they represent more than 1/3 of Catalonia's population. If we add smaller cities this number can rise to nearly half of the population of Catalonia.

Will the Generalitat sanction those mayors? No. The law provides the possibility for the Catalan government to choose alternative polling stations in the case the city councils refuse to obey this law.

2) There's a draw to choose the members of each voting table. If they refuse to be part of those tables because the law is suspended, will the Catalan government put a fine on them? Spanish law provides for imprisonment from 3 months to 1 year for members of a voting table who are absent without justification. How will the Catalan government enforce this article? By using the same Spanish laws that they are violating? No, the law provides the use of substitute members or the first voters to arrive in order to fill the voting tables.

So: they will not have to force anyone to do anything against their will because they don't have the power to do so.

3) Furthermore, less than a month before the referendum we don't know the census. And the Generalitat may have violated some Data Protection Laws to acquire it. The Catalans that live abroad have already begun to receive the ballot. But how many Catalans live abroad? According to CERA (the Spanish census for residents abroad), 200.000. And how many Catalans abroad were registered so far in June on the ad hoc census created by the Generalitat? 5.000.

4) And there's more: in order to pass this law, the majority violated the Parliament's rules of procedure and the rights of the minority groups.

The two civil servants of highest rank of the Parliament refused to be part of any of the steps in the approval of that law. Those civil servants (General Secretary and the top legal counselor) warned in a report that the approval of that law violated several warnings from theConstitutional Court. They also warned against using the single reading tho approve laws that modified Catalonia's own fundamental law (Estatut).

Catalonia have his own Constitutional Court (although it’s not binding): the "Consell de Garanties Estatutàries" (CGE). The CGE had already warned against using such procedure to approve that kind of law. The President of the Parliament refused to read the report of the legal counselor warning about the illegality of that law. Someone used the seal of the General Secretary of the Parliament (without his authorisation) to publish the law. 

The majority groups wanted to approve those two laws using a single reading procedure, for they wanted to bypass some usual procedures (amendments, an opinion from the CGE, etc.). But the CGE said that the use of the single reading procedure couldn't ignore the right of the groups to demand his opinion on the law before its approval. The majority didn't want to because it would lengthen the process. They knew that the TC would suspend those laws.

Catalonia doesn't have an electoral law of his own, so it uses the Spanish one (LOREG). The Estatut (Catalonia's fundamental law) establishes that a 2/3 majority is needed to approve the electoral law. They approved the Sindicatura Electoral (electoral control commission) by simple majority.