Eduardo González
The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, received yesterday in Madrid the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, on the occasion of the approval by the Community Executive of the Spanish Government’s Recovery Plan to overcome the crisis caused by the pandemic.
“I am pleased to announce that the European Commission has given the green light to Spain’s plan”, said Ursula von der Leyen at the joint press conference, held at the headquarters of Red Eléctrica Española, in Alcobendas (Madrid). “Once the plan receives the go-ahead from the European Council, we will be able to disburse the first funds in July”, she continued. “This is the beginning of a tough journey. We are facing a historic challenge and opportunity, and we must implement this ambitious Spanish plan because it is an unprecedented opportunity”, she warned. “The plan was designed in Spain and it is going to foster Spain’s growth” and help Spain emerge “stronger and more prepared after this crisis”, she added.
“Today is a historic day for Spain and for Europe”, Pedro Sánchez declared at the same press conference. “It is the day that the Commission has approved the transformation, recovery and resilience plan that we have been working on for the last few months”. “The plans approved today in the two brother countries of the Iberian Peninsula (Portugal’s plan was also given the green light yesterday) open the door to a new way of understanding the EU”, he added.
“President Von der Leyen has always shown herself to be close to Spain, especially in the hardest moments, and that is something we do not forget”, assured Sánchez, who highlighted the “leadership” exercised by the President of the Commission during the July 2020 negotiations at the European Council, in which “an extraordinary effort was demanded of all of us to approve the Next Generation recovery program and the International Financial Framework”.
“That effort has been maintained in Spain to draw up a rigorous plan that complied with the four axes requested by the European Commission: the digitalization of our economy, social cohesion, ecological transition and the gender perspective”, added the head of the Executive, who assured that the Spanish plan contains “more than one hundred reforms” that, in the Commission’s opinion, “comply with all the objectives on which the plan is based”.
“A disbursement schedule for the next three years has also been approved,” Sánchez explained. “This year alone, Spain expects to receive 19 billion euros” that will have “an effect in helping recovery and job creation”. “We hope that in four weeks’ time the European Council will pronounce itself in the same way as the Commission does in order to make Spain’s plan official”, added the President of the Government. “Once this step has been taken, I will convene a conference of regional presidents to discuss the plan” so that “there is the greatest possible consensus”, because “this is a country plan that concerns us all” and that represents “an opportunity to modernize this country for future generations”.
The approval of the plan will give the Government access to 69,500 million euros in non-refundable subsidies over the next six years, half of the 140,000 million euros allocated to Spain in the Next Generation EU. According to the timetable envisaged by Brussels, Spain could receive a total of 19 billion this year. On the one hand, our country will automatically receive an advance of 9 billion – 13% of the money that corresponds to Spain in subsidies – after the Council of Economic and Finance Ministers (Ecofin) approves the plan, foreseeably at its meeting on July 13. Apart from this, there will be an additional disbursement of 10,000 million, scheduled for the end of the year, which will depend on the fulfillment of 50 goals agreed by Madrid with Brussels. To receive the 69.5 billion euros in subsidies, which will be released every six months, Spain will have to meet more than 400 targets. The largest disbursement should arrive in June 2022, with 13.8 billion euros.
