A little over sixty minutes. This is how long the reception of Fernando López Miras lasted, at the Moncloa Palace, six years after the last handshake that the head of the Executive of the Region of Murcia gave to the President of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez, a distant September 18, 2018. And this is what López Miras declared this Friday, during his next appearance to the press: “ANDn in just one hour, we had to address questions that had been pending for six years“.
López Miras arrived at the Moncloa Palace this Friday, at ten in the morning, with a file full of requests for the Region of Murcia, but among all, the Murcian president focused particularly on two issues. The first : reform the regional financing system. At the same time, while this reform is not taking place, the popular leader asked the President of the Government that the historic underfinancing of the Region of Murcia be compensated with 2,340 million euros, as a transitional fund.
In addition, it required a short-term debt refinancing operation, for an amount of no less than 550 million euros. López Miras justified these two requests, during his press conference, by providing data: “In Murcia, we receive 650 million euros less than the average for the rest of the communities“; “We Murcia are the Spaniards who receive the least funds from the Government to maintain health, education…”; “the Government of the Region of Murcia assumes 80% of the cost of the Dependency Law compared to 20% of the Spanish Government”…
Water management was the second key issue that López Miras conveyed to Sánchez. Concretely, the development of a National Water Pact and the future of the Tajo-Segura transfer, taking into account the fact that the president of Castilla-La Mancha, Emiliano García-Page, is putting pressure on the Ministry of Transition ecological to modify the transfer operating rules. “I told him of the need to have a body of water that manages this resource under the same conditions for all Spaniards and that guarantees our food sovereignty.”
López Miras demanded a state agreement on water issues, emphasizing a fact: “The Murcians pay 193% more for water than in other territories”. According to him, this pact must address “all available resources”, groundwater, desalination, urban water regeneration and interconnection between basins. Which led him to warn that “there cannot be a single reduction in the Tajo-Segura transfer” because the water situation in the Segura basin is worrying: “The majority of the country’s basins are above 50%. and the water level of the Segura is at 16%.
But during his appearance to the press this Friday, at the end of the reception at Moncloa which coincided with the birthday of Fernando López Miras, the Murcian president thus summed up the feeling with which the meeting with Pedro Sánchez ended , after having transmitted to him his main requests. : financing and water resources. “I leave as I arrived, even if the meeting was cordial“.
Pedro Sánchez receives Fernando López Miras at the Moncloa Palace.
By land, sea and air, the Murcian leader reiterated the importance for Pedro Sánchez to address the reform of the regional financing system and a National Water Plan, including these two subjects on the agenda of the next Conference of Presidents. “I informed you of the urgent need“, as López Miras pointed out.
During the little more than sixty minutes that his meeting with Pedro Sánchez lasted, the head of the Executive of the Region of Murcia took the opportunity to convey his “concern” regarding the agreements that the Spanish government is concluding on tax matters and financing with Catalan independence parties. “The president of the government is clear on the agreement with Catalonia and I have expressed my concern about the breakdown of the solidarity fund.”
A statement that López Miras has made on several occasions: “The agreement with Catalonia will break the principle of solidarity”. For the leader of the Murcian PP, “autonomous financing is a state issue”, and that is why, during the press conference in front of the media, López Miras publicly asked Pedro Sánchez to hold “multilateral meetings” with all the autonomous communities, through the Conference. of presidents and the Fiscal and Financial Policy Council.
The Minister of Territorial Policy
At the press conference after López Miras, it’s his turn to appearThe Minister of Territorial Policy, Ángel Víctor Torres, has constantly raised the issue of the regional financing system.
In fact, Minister Torres emphasized Pedro Sánchez’s “will” to “update” this model in the “competent body”: the Fiscal and Financial Policy Council where all the Treasury advisors from the 17 autonomous communities are present. “This does not mean that we cannot speak at the Conference of Presidents,” he clarified.
Sánchez during the meeting with López Miras.
The head of Territorial Policy recognized that Regional funding system ‘needs an update’ since 2009but he emphasized that since then there have also been other tenants of Moncloa who have not addressed this issue: “I must recall that from 2012 to 2018 the Presidency of the Government was in the hands of Mariano Rajoy and There was no system update.
“That is why the Spanish government declares once again that if this system were opened and renewed, it would be so that the different communities, without exception, receive more resources.” In this sense, the minister took the opportunity to remind López Miras that the Region of Murcia receives more money with Pedro Sánchez (PSOE) in Moncloa than with Mariano Rajoy (PP): “They received 7.744 million euros more“.
The minister also highlighted the migration crisis facing the Canary Islands: “The question of immigration, in particular of minors, requires a united, obligatory and fair response, by all territories.” Torres wanted to “valorize” the message of “responsibility” launched by López Miras in the management of menas: “We hope that it will also reach the Popular Party.” “We will move towards an agreement that we believe it is possible on the part of the Spanish government.”
