The Diplomat
The government on Friday formally requested the second disbursement of the Recovery and Resilience Mechanism for 12 billion euros, the Ministry of Finance and Public Administration said yesterday.
The request was made on the same day that the government of Pedro Sánchez presented in Brussels the table in which he admits a slowdown of the national economy, going from a growth forecast of 7% to 4.3%. The figure is included in the Stability Plan 2022-2025 that the government has sent to Europe, as well as a public deficit of 5% this year and a public debt of 115.2%.
The Ministry points out that the satisfactory assessment of 40 milestones and objectives that have been met during the second half of 2021 will lead to the disbursement of the amount requested from Brussels, which would be added to the 9,036 million euros of pre-financing and the 10,000 million euros of the first disbursement, received in 2021, reports Europa Press.
With this request, Spain becomes the first Member State to request this second disbursement and “demonstrates that it is the most advanced country in the implementation of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (PRTR)”.
From now on, the European Commission has a period of two months to analyse and verify the documentation submitted by the Spanish government in order to make the disbursement.
The Treasury explains that this new request for payments includes the bulk of the measures “to transform and rebalance labour relations and the pension system in our economy, including the labour reform, one of the main programmatic commitments for this legislature, and the reform of the public pension system”, according to which the pension revaluation index is repealed and the purchasing power of pensions is guaranteed to be maintained.
Within the green and digital axes, this second disbursement request also includes the approval of the roadmap for offshore wind energy and other offshore energies; the Safe, Sustainable and Connected Mobility Strategy; the Charter of Digital Rights, and the entry into force of the royal decree law for the protection of workers engaged in home delivery activities using digital platforms or tax measures to accelerate the deployment of the 5G network.
In addition, the second disbursement will also serve to finance measures that have been put in place such as the modernisation of the Tax Agency, the approval of the Action Plan for Primary and Community Care and the improvement of the functioning of the food chain.
