What should be a Technical Meeting to address the necessary reform of the regional financing system It has become a new chapter of this Thursday afternoon disagreements between him Central government and the Junta de Andalucía. Sources of the Ministry of Economy, Finance and European Funds reveal to Okdiario Andalucía that the Ministry of Finance, led by María Jesús Monterohas tended to “trap” to the Andalusian representatives, disguising the meeting as a Technical Dialogue Space that, in reality, I was looking for impose an agenda centered on the Debt condonation.
The appointment, celebrated telematically, just lasted a few minutes. From Andalusia They came a Secretary General and the Chief of Cabinetwilling to discuss a more fair financing model for the region. However, they met a delegation of the Ministry that, far from meeting his demands, he insisted on Talk exclusively about debt removean issue that the Board had already rejected flat in a previous letter. “They did not answer the letter, but by institutional loyalty we attended the meeting,” explain the same sources, which underline the clarity with which the Andalusian technicians left their position on the table: Autonomic financing is priority, Not the condonation.
The Ministry, meanwhile, did not hesitate filter previously your proposal to the media: an alleged savings of 1.4 billion euros for Andalusia in ten years, at the rate of 140 million annually. A figure that is not only misleading, but lacks real impact for citizens. And, in effect, those amounts will not result in improvements in Health, education or dependence, They will be trapped in an accounting limbo, far from the needs of the Andalusians.
And it is that it takes the one that proposes the Sánchez executive It only eliminates debt capital, not interest, which the regions will continue to pay. In this way, this condonation does not inject fresh money, but forces to use new debt to amortize the old one, without leaving room to spend on anything else. Far from being a solutionthe proposal of Pedro Sánchez It is a custom suit for ERCthat does not solve the structural problems of the regions, and that has been hardly questioned by Rating agencies, Think Tanks and experts.
Pedro Sánchez’s executive maneuver has been interpreted in Andalusia as an attempt to “make up” commitments with other communities – in veiled allusion to Catalonia– While the structural deficit that drowns the Junta de Andalucía, which qualifies the proposal of “absolute trap” and “whitening blackmail” to silence the legitimate demands of the region.
And the government ensures that the debt removes –18,791 million euros in the case of Andalusia – would relieve regional finances. But the small print of the agreement denies it. According to him point 3.5 of the government proposal“Debt absorption measures will only reach the capital of the affected debt, without including accrued interest or other linked costs.” That is, Andalusia He would continue to pay the interests of that debt, now and in the future, without real relief in his accounts. From the Board they explain that «the foronation does not imply a transfer of funds or releases money for public services. Debt amortizations are paid with more debt that cannot be used for anything else ».
The meeting lasted minutes
Despite the insistence of Ministry in presenting the condonation As a step towards financial autonomy, the Board It also disassembles this argument. «We already went to the markets and comply with the fiscal rules; We do not need to sell us something we already have, ”they replicate, remembering that the current debt is, to a large extent, a ballast inherited from socialist times – including the management of itself Huntsman in Andalusia. The region, they say, does not generate new debt, but is limited to refinance what dragsa common practice in all public administrations.
“We don’t need to sell us something we already have”
The brief telematic exchange revealed the lack of tune between a Central government committed to your story and a meeting that is denies to fall into what considers a game of appearances. Andalusiafirst community to accept the dialogue after Catalonia, went with the hand laid, but is not willing to “Take your hair.” While the Ministry It is entangled in leaks and holders, the region is still waiting for a serious response to its historical claim: a Fair financing system that does not depend on cosmetic operations or empty promises.
