The Popular Group of the Congress of Deputies has registered for debate in plenary a proposal for a non-law (PNL) in which it emphasizes that the case of fraudulent labor regulation files (ERE) “existed” and calls for a “condemnation” by the lower house of the “political actions” that “facilitated” it.
This is what can be read in the text of this parliamentary initiative of the PP regarding “the condemnation of the fraud of a million dollars of public money produced in the Junta de Andalucía between 2000 and 2009”, registered after the rulings of the Constitutional Court (TC) that in the past During the months of June and July, they partially examined the appeals for the protection of a dozen former senior officials of the previous stage of the socialist administration of the junta convicted in this case, among whom were former presidents Manuel Chaves and José Antonio Griñán.
Specifically, the PP wants with this PNL, consulted by Europa Press, that the Congress of Deputies condemns and disapproves “the political actions and decisions that have facilitated and favored the fraudulent use of millions of public euros through the deliberate elimination of controls on the management of funds for socio-professional aid. These elements were managed by the entity first called the Andalusian Development Institute (IFA) and later the Andalusian Innovation and Development Agency (IDEA) during the decade between 2000 and 2009.
In the explanatory statement to justify this initiative, the PP refers to the ruling of the Provincial Court of Seville which, on 19 November 2019, “sentenced various members of the government of the Junta de Andalucía to various sanctions for the so-called ‘ERE case'”, and which was subsequently confirmed – in September 2022 – by the Supreme Court (TS) after being appealed in cassation.
“The two convictions have presented, after a broad investigation, a solid set of proven facts that prove the existence of a system of payment of socio-work aid through the Andalusian Development Institute (IFA) devoid of any type of control,” he emphasizes the PP of the PNL that was submitted to Congress.
Illegal beneficiaries
From the Popular Group, they point out that “the convictions also prove that the processing of hundreds of millions of public euros through these mechanisms devoid of any administrative procedure allowed the inclusion of beneficiaries who had not belonged to the companies theoretically aided, thus facilitating the continued receipt of these incomes after having ceased to meet the theoretical requirements, or even endorsing the use of these funds for purposes totally unrelated to socio-professional aid.
This “system” (he goes on to explain the PP initiative) “was gradually institutionalized to overcome various obstacles that the internal control mechanisms of the autonomous administration warned against”, so that, “to avoid negative reports from these bodies, first budgetary changes, then a framework agreement never published or reported by the legal services and, finally, a concealment of this aid in a budget item for financing transfers to the IFA which allowed these expenditure files not to be subject to the necessary control.
The Constitutional Court’s “exercise of control”
After this description of the system of payment of socio-work aid “devoid of any type of control” which would be at the basis of the ERE case, the PP evokes in its PNL “the exercise of control of ordinary jurisdiction unprecedented to date” that the Constitutional Court made by partially upholding several appeals for protection filed by senior officials found guilty of these events.
“The rulings of the Constitutional Court do not call into question the proven facts or the existence of this system of uncontrolled management of millions of public euros or its use for deceptive purposes,” they emphasize from the PP, from where they add that these rulings “argue that the mechanism used by the accused to allow this system – the creation of a specific item in the regional budget laws – cannot be punished by ordinary justice because it subsequently received the parliamentary approval necessary for its application. entry into force.”
“That is to say: the events occurred, uncontrolled spending took place, fraudulent uses of public money were consumed and senior officials facilitated this, but they cannot be subject to criminal liability – partly because the judgment recognizes it for the processing of certain budgetary modifications – because the acts with which they enabled this procedure were not administrative but political, framed in the relationship between the government and Parliament”, can be read in the explanatory statement of the PNL of the PP.
The Popular Group then argues that the aforementioned rulings of the TC “do not and cannot establish” an “alternative factual version of what happened in Andalusia in those years”, with “millions of public euros” that “were managed without control” and “used for purposes other than those intended through a mechanism designed and facilitated by the highest government officials of the Council.”
“Very serious acts of corruption”
The PP justifies the presentation of this initiative by the postulate that “it is worrying that a false perception is established in public opinion according to which these very serious acts of corruption never took place, or that the accused leaders had no connection with them, while “this is not what can be deduced from convictions that only call into question the possibility of criminally prosecuting facts that are not denied.”
“It would be extremely serious for public discourse and the political and administrative ethics of our country if an action that is undoubtedly harmful to public interests were accepted, even if it were only for discursive and public opinion purposes, as an action that is undoubtedly harmful to public interests,” warns the Popular Group, to then point out that “the ERE case existed, the funds were used inappropriately and the officials of the Andalusian government activated the mechanisms that deliberately facilitated this fraud, regardless of whether the means they used for this were included or not in the scope of criminal prosecution.
“The controversial or non-controversial origin of the criminal reproach in this case must in no case exclude the public, political, moral and ethical reproach necessary for a way of acting that has marked public management in Andalusia for years”, concludes the PP to justify the presentation of this PNL while waiting for the debate in plenary session of the Congress of Deputies.
