The City Council of Lleida wants to prohibit the use of the burqa and any other full veil in public spaces and municipal areas through the new civility ordinance, which the local government plans to bring to the June plenary session for its approval.
The proposal establishes in its article 12 that it will be prohibited to wear any garment or attire that conceals the face in public spaces. The measure affects the full veil, although the wording extends to any element that prevents showing the face.
Fines and exceptions provided in the ordinance
The text proposes that the concealment of the face be considered a minor infraction. In that case, the foreseen sanction will be between 300 and 750 euros. The ordinance, as a whole, also establishes a sanctioning framework with minor infractions from 400 to 750 euros, serious ones from 751 to 1,500 euros and very serious ones from 1,501 to 3,000 euros.
The prohibition will not apply in places of worship, nor in spaces where covering the face is an accepted social custom, nor in those situations in which it is done in exercise of a fundamental right.
The local government defends a rights-based approach
The mayor, Fèlix Larrosa, and the deputy mayor for Feminism, Carme Valls, have framed the measure in a different perspective from the one that the Paeria already tried to promote more than a decade ago. Both maintain that the ordinance does not seek to isolate or socially exclude women who wear a full veil.
Larrosa has defended that the proposal has another approach and that it is not formulated from a security issue, but from fundamental rights, with special attention to the right of women to decide. In parallel, the council plans to activate a complementary plan to avoid situations of revictimization.
A parallel plan to avoid exclusion
That plan, linked to the application of the ordinance, is aimed at enabling affected women to have real autonomy, social ties and access to resources. The municipal objective is to accompany the sanctioning measure with support and follow-up actions.
The initiative reopens a debate that in Lleida already had a precedent in 2010, when the government of Ángel Ros approved a ban on the burqa that later was annulled by the Tribunal Supremo. Now, the municipal executive hopes to push forward a new text with a different basis and leave it ready for voting in the June plenary session.