BREAKING – Madrid. Spain’s Transport Minister Óscar Puente (PSOE) has just resigned. He announced his departure at around 9 p.m. in the Diputación Permanente, the standing committee that represents parliament while it is dissolved. He is also withdrawing as a candidate in the general election on 29 November.
Spain Expat Press Editorial Team
The trigger was the train crash at Urda, in the province of Toledo, almost a week ago, which killed 69 people. Puente said a transport minister could not stay in office after two accidents of such severity in less than a year. That held true whether or not he bore direct responsibility, he added. He called it a matter of political dignity, consistency and empathy with the victims.
Two disasters on the high-speed network
At 8:54 a.m. on 28 October, an AVE train run by state operator Renfe collided with a train from private operator Iryo near Urda. The crash happened at kilometre 118 of the Madrid–Seville high-speed line. The official toll stands at 69 dead and more than 100 injured. It is Spain’s worst rail disaster since 2013.
The main early hypothesis is human error in traffic control following a signalling fault. Puente himself had called the decision by rail-infrastructure manager Adif’s control centre to let the AVE proceed a mistake. A court in nearby Orgaz is leading the investigation.
The country had already been shaken in January by a crash at Adamuz (Córdoba). On 18 January, an Iryo train from Málaga to Madrid derailed there and struck an Alvia bound for Huelva on the adjacent track. 46 people died.
Resignation after more than four hours of questioning
Puente announced his decision only at the end of a hearing on the crash that lasted more than four hours. He had given no hint of it in his earlier remarks. Every parliamentary group except the PSOE and EH Bildu had demanded his resignation, including the government’s usual allies.
The move came as a surprise. Only hours earlier, government sources had insisted that Puente would not resign and that Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez would not dismiss him. He was also due to remain the PSOE’s lead candidate in Valladolid. Puente says he told Sánchez just minutes before making the announcement.
Reactions and the campaign
The opposition reacted sharply. PP parliamentary spokeswoman Ester Muñoz said the resignation came “116 deaths too late”, referring to the victims of both crashes. Gabriel Rufián (ERC), by contrast, was the first to approach Puente and praised him as a great minister.
The resignation lands in the middle of the pre-election campaign. A first SocioMétrica poll after the Urda crash shows Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s PP gaining two seats, the PSOE losing two and Vox gaining one. It is not yet known who will run the Transport Ministry until the election. This story will be updated.
