The plenary session of the Galician Parliament gave the green light to the Analysis of the Contas Council on the economic activity of the Xunta in 2021 amid criticism from the opposition, which considers that the work of the control body of the autonomous administration “is stretched” in time to reduce the impact of its recommendations which, according to the BNG and the PSdeG, are not taken into account by the Xunta.
The second item on the agenda of the plenary session was the debate and vote on the opinion and proposed resolutions of the non-legislative Standing Committee for Relations with the Consello de Contas, who analyzed the organization’s activity report for 2022, in which the focus was on the general account of the Xunta for the previous year.
Thus, in addition to having received the green light for the general opinion without a voice against, the Parliament also approved two recommendations of the Popular Group, which, on the one hand, urges the Xunta to “continue to comply effectively” with the recommendations of Contas. and on the other hand, it advocates advancing digitalization and telematic presentation of their activities.
Likewise, the majority group facilitated the integration of two contributions from the PSdeG into the conclusions – none from the BNG was accepted. In this way, they moved forward, also without votes against but with the abstention of the Bloc, which are analyzed the accounts of research foundations linked to the Galician Health Service and that the Xunta agrees with local entities on a study on the cost of the abusive powers assumed by municipal corporations.
Regarding the financial stability objectives for the year 2023, the Regional Executive closed with a deficit of 0.18% of GDP, almost three points less than in 2022and a public debt of 16.1%, “the lowest rate since 2012” and 3.7 points lower than that of the previous year.
The President, Alfonso Rueda, together with the Minister of Finance and Public Administration, Miguel Corgos, affirmed that Galicia executed 99.6% of its consolidated budget last yearnot counting the European Next Generation funds. In addition, “not only has it been one of the communities that has achieved the deficit and debt targets”, but it is “one of those that leads the average payment period to suppliers”, with 14.82 days compared to the average of 27.87 of all autonomies.
Current income
Miguel Corgos was in charge of giving more details on the Xeral account corresponding to the 2023 financial year. In this sense, the advisor highlighted how. Galician finances reserved around 9% in 2023 of its current income (1,089 million) to finance capital operations that contribute to the economic improvement of Galicia in the medium term.
Regarding the investment effort, Galicia dedicated last year 17% of the total non-financial expenditure to investments. Based on all these indicators, Corgos reaffirmed that The Xunta is committed to growth based on compliance with deficit and debt targetswhile allowing for “spending room” in investments, services and payments to suppliers.
In the same spirit, the president of the Xunta confirmed that budgets for 2025 They are already “in the preparation phase”, which is being done “with meaning” to “be able to accredit figures as notable” as those of the Conta Xeral of 2023 within a year.
Path to deficit
Miguel Corgos also warned that “a government cannot go three years without a budget”, after Pedro Sánchez’s executive delayed the treatment of the deficit in Congress. The head of Galician public accounts confirmed that this postponement is a “logical consequence” from the lack of support from Sanchez.
According to him, this demonstrates what the Xunta of Alfonso Rueda “says.” “It is important to have a budget. A government cannot go three years without a budget“If the deficit trajectory were not approved, it would be practically impossible to continue moving forward with the preparation of the public accounts of the general administration of the State,” Corgos stressed.
This is why he stressed that it was necessary to agree on these routes, so that they could be approved, with all the necessary procedures. the budgetary stability lawand to be able to follow the budget process, which is not guaranteed even if you have the path. But “without a path,” he added, “of course, there can be no budget,” he said. For his part, he said the regional government would continue with the preparation of its accounts, which it plans to present on October 20.
