The ‘president’ of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès , visited the CCOO de Catalunya headquarters this Monday , in what was the first institutional visit to one of the most representative social agents in Catalonia.

The leader of the central with the most union delegates in the country, Javier Pacheco , has urged the ‘Honorable Molt’ to approve as soon as possible budgets “that take advantage of the funds of the European Union and the current debt limits to use them strategically” as made public by the union in a subsequent statement.

Aragonès has decided to visit number 32 of Via Laietana , after declining to participate in person at the CCOO confederal congress held this past weekend. He did pronounce a few words telematically to the delegates of the central, but, unlike other ‘presidents’, he did not participate from the arena.

This Monday, however, he did appear at the headquarters of CCOO de Catalunya, where he held a meeting with the leadership of the union. From the central they have thanked him for the ” symbolic gesture towards the working class ” and have demanded a “determined” government action to prevent the consequences of the economic crisis derived from the covid from falling on their backs.

Pacheco has transferred to Aragonès the concern of the union in relation to public investment in dependency and has urged him to “correct” the management of the dependency care system. “It is urgent and that is why we urge the Government to immediately begin talks to create the Catalan Dependency Institute “, the union leader has transferred to him.

A larger budget for the Renda Garantida de Ciutadania, while better coordinating with the Minimum Living Income (IMV) has been another of the demands transferred from CCOO.

The management of the European funds that fall into Catalonia will be a shared competence between ERC and JxCat in the scheme of the new Govner.

For this purpose, Pacheco has also had words for the Republican leader and has transmitted to him that from the central they will not accept investment projects “not negotiated” with the legal representation of the workers, as well as a fraudulent use of them and that they end up going destined to pay compensation for dismissal or to add to income accounts; without a social return on investment.

Pacheco has also asked the new ‘president’ to participate in social dialogue with employers and unions to move forward with the new legislation over the next few years and to travel to the spaces for consultation. Something that, in the opinion expressed by Pacheco himself on previous occasions, the previous Government lacked.

“As vaccination advances and restrictions are progressively lifted, economic activity will recover strongly.” With this hopeful analysis, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) designates Spain as the eurozone country that will experience the highest growth this year and even more in 2022.

In its outlook report, the Paris-based economic institution foresees that the Spanish gross domestic product will increase by 5.9% in 2021 and 6.3% in 2022 thanks to the progress of the vaccination campaign that will allow “to release the demand repressed ”and will facilitate“ the gradual recovery of tourism ”.

Starting in the second half of 2021, the economy will experience significant dynamism encouraged by the different measures of the national recovery plan. The easing of restrictions and uncertainty will translate into a drop in savings that will fuel consumption and a significant increase in investment.

However, the OECD warns of a “risk” factor in this idyllic recovery: “the increase in [corporate] insolvencies once government aid is eliminated”. Thus, the withdrawal of fiscal stimuli should, according to the report, be done “gradually” when the economy is on the path of stable growth.

Slow job recovery
The economic think tank places special emphasis on the situation of companies and the labor market. “If the crisis lasts longer than expected, it might be necessary to increase the amount of financing for this type of direct aid,” says the OECD, referring to direct aid aimed at protecting the business fabric which, in its opinion, should run ” quickly “.

Regarding employment, according to the agency’s estimates, its recovery will be slow: the unemployment rate, which reached 15.5% of the workforce in 2020, will only decrease by one tenth in 2021 and will stand at 14.7% in 2022.

The developed countries club advises “to maintain a flexible labor market that allows companies to adapt to possible structural adjustments after the pandemic” and to invest in vocational training to “improve the qualifications of workers and allow their” relocation to the sectors with better prospects ”.

The head of division in the OECD’s Department of Economics, Aída Caldera, questioned by the EFE agency, recalls that Spain registers one of the highest temporary employment rates in the EU, a negative factor for productivity since it encourages reduction investment and generates excessive mobility. Therefore, the economist advises “to clarify and limit the ways in which it can be hired temporarily.”

Reform pensions
Along with unemployment, the rise in the level of debt appears as one of the main collateral effects of the health crisis with an increase of almost 25 points – up to 120% of GDP – in 2020, a figure considered “appropriate” by Aída Caldera for protect companies and workers from the social and economic consequences of the pandemic. The OECD predicts that with a public deficit of 8.6% this year, the debt will only decrease to 119% and with 5.4% in 2022 to 117.4%.

In this context, pension reform will play an essential role in avoiding a new rise in public debt. The economic body estimates that, without any modification, the debt would rise to 170% of GDP in 2050, the weight of pensions would go from 11% of current GDP to 15%.

The think tank proposes, for example, increasing the number of years of contributions that give the right to a full pension or linking the retirement age to the evolution of life expectancy. The reform must be consensual, the OECD estimates, to ensure its long-term sustainability.

International panorama
According to OECD forecasts, among the main developed economies, only Canada (6.1%), the United States (6.9%) and the United Kingdom (7.2%) will outperform Spanish growth, the rebound of which is explained by the decline which suffered in 2020 , registering the largest drop among members of the single currency and even the entire OECD (-10.8%). At the European level, the Spanish economy will grow more than the German, which should increase by 3.3%, the French, with 5.8%, and the Italian, with 4.5%.

In 2022, the growth of the Spanish economy will continue its upward trend. The agency’s estimates place Spain as the growth leader in 2022 , ahead of the United Kingdom, Germany and Italy.

The new ‘minister’ of Empresa i Treball, Roger Torrent , has decided to release his mandate by visiting the Seat facilities in Martorell . The first visit of the Republican leader was to the first Catalan company in number of workers in Catalonia, which currently employs 15,300 people.

Torrent seeks to weave ties with the automobile firm, after the Generalitat gave a sit-in to the head of the Volkswagen Group , Herbert Diess, when on March 5 he visited the Catalan plant to present the firm’s electromobility plans . The reason why neither the then head of the Company, Ramon Tremosa(from JxCat), neither the then ‘vice president’, Pere Aragonès , appeared at the factory because they did not coincide with either the King or the Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez .

Torrent has visited the facilities of the automobile firm in Martorell, where he has met with the president of Seat, Wayne Griffiths . “Seat is important not only from a historical point of view, but because it has been a key agent in all the transformations of the country’s production model”, declared the ‘minister’. “In the coming months we will specify and announce the administrative participation of this transition process towards electric mobility”, he added.

The new ‘conseller’ is not only responsible for the Department of Business, but after the reorganization of the new Government he also directs the competences in matters of Work. In a clear nod to this duality of responsibilities, Torrent has scheduled his visit to Seat to end it with a meeting with the president of the works council, Matías Carnero .

Carnero has been in charge of the legal representation of the workers of the motor company for more than two decades and is, in turn, president of the UGT de Catalunya.

Pending subjects
Torrent, as a new ‘minister’, has several pending issues that directly concern Seat. The first was to ‘pamper’ the car firm, hurt by the rudeness of the Catalan administration last March. From the business world at that time the decision of the leaders of the Generalitat was criticized and from employers such as Foment del Treball it was described as “ridiculous”.

Although Torrent not only has pending affections with Seat. The president of the firm, Wayne Griffiths, criticized in a recent interview in EL PERIÓDICO the lack of involvement of the Catalan administration for professional training projects for the automobile. “It is one of the issues that I want to discuss with the Government of Catalonia,” said Griffiths; missing an interlocutor on the other side.

Precisely a few kilometers from the Seat factory in Martorell, the Generalitat has had a training center in place since 2015 and that cost the taxpayer 17.6 million euros . Practically empty, with only some occupational courses that fill 10% of the capacity for 14,000 students that have the facilities. And while the Center de Formació Professional de la Automoció is almost empty, Seat is expanding its own facilities to train the new generation of operators who assemble the electric car.

This Tuesday the new electricity bill comes into force, a new system with which the home user will pay more or less at the end of the month depending on the time they use their appliances.

But it will only be the starting point of a series of changes that threaten to give a twist to the complex electricity bill to give impetus to a technology that aims to be the center of the energy transition and that currently depends on a hodgepodge of issues that go from meteorology to the accumulated deficit of the electricity system until 2013.

Specifically, what a domestic consumer pays at the end of the month on their receipt corresponds approximately 33% to the price of electricity in the wholesale market; 47% to regulated costs and 20% to taxes.

In turn, the regulated costs, which affect both the energy and power terms, are divided into tolls (cost of the transmission and distribution network that accounts for about 21% of the bill) and charges (to cover the cost of the extra-peninsular production, renewable premiums and the deficit of the tariff that represent 27%).

As of tomorrow, the total amount of these tolls and charges does not vary, but the price (regulated by the CNMC and the Government, respectively) that is granted to them, which will be different depending on the time of day, both in the term of energy as in power, to give a «price signal» to the consumer and help him to adapt, thus, his consumption when he realizes that his pocket will depend on it.

In practice, this means that starting this June, all users will have time discrimination in three sections, that is, it will be more expensive for them to consume electricity in the period that corresponds to the ‘peak’ time and cheaper in the ‘valley’, while it will be intermediate in the ‘plain’. So much so that ironing on the weekend instead of doing it at 10 a.m. during the week may entail a ‘discount’ of 38 euros on a consumer’s annual bill, according to the CNMC.

In addition, they will also be able to contract two different powers in their homes, one for peak periods and another for valley periods, so that those consumers who want a higher power, for example, to charge the electric vehicle, will be able to contract a higher power for the night and maintain their usual power the rest of the day, and thus they will not have to pay the extra cost that a high power would suppose all day. A way to encourage the use of the car and the electric motorcycle.

The objective is not to lower the price of the bill but to shift consumption from the periods of highest demand (during the day on weekdays) to those of less demand (at night and on weekends) to avoid stressing the electricity grid in the face of this electrification of the economy and, at the same time, accelerate the entry of new agents such as the electric car or self-consumption, according to the CNMC and the Government.

Although with this modification there will be winners and losers, because a priori, the best positioned are the consumers subject to the Voluntary Price of Small Consumer (PVPC) rate without hourly discrimination who will see their bill reduced without doing anything; while those who have time discrimination will notice a certain increase, if they do not change their consumption, according to the regulator.

More changes
But this is not the only change. The Government plans to approve at its meeting of ministers tomorrow a draft bill to reduce part of the ‘profits from the sky’ of nuclear and hydroelectric plants in the midst of escalating electricity prices in the wholesale market (known as ‘pool’) by reduce their carbon dividends, that is, the revenue that these technologies obtain when the price of CO2 emission rights is very high and combined cycles are the last to match supply and demand.

The price of the ‘pool’ stood on average this month at 65 euros per megawatt-hour, above the 60 euros in Filomena’s January, although now instead of the cold and gas it is, fundamentally, due to the rise in CO2 emission rights prices that have skyrocketed due to speculation.

Although a slow entry into force is anticipated, such as the one that the National Fund for the Sustainability of the Electricity System (FNSSE) will have, called the ‘green fund’, which plans to eliminate part of the charges from the bill. Specifically, the 7,000 million euros corresponding to the premiums for renewables, which the Government wants to transfer progressively within five years of receipt to energy companies (electricity, gas and oil companies).

This measure would mean a saving of 13% in the bill at the end of the period, according to the Executive, and would make electricity more popular compared to other technologies such as fossil fuels that could see their cost increase with this and other measures, such as the famous diesel tax. At the moment, it is being analyzed by the State Council, while the gas industry is pressing to modify it.

The singer Miguel Bosé must pay the Tax Agency a fine of more than 23,000 euros after the Superior Court of Justice of Madrid has confirmed the claims for the settlement of taxes for 2010 and 2011 in which he deducted expenses such as hams, training and physiotherapy.

The Administrative Litigation Chamber of the Madrid Supreme Court has dismissed two appeals filed by Bosé, administrator of Costanagua SL, a company dedicated to the production and management of the singer’s artistic activities, against decisions of the Regional Economic Administrative Court of Madrid.

One of the decisions confirmed by the Supreme Court referred to the claims regarding the VAT settlement of 2010 and 2011, for 55,350 euros, and the penalty imposed on Bosé, derived from the previous one, for 23,536.87 euros. The second is the one relating to the two Corporation Tax settlement agreements for the same fiscal years, for 62,962 euros.

Improper deductions
According to the decisions of the Administrative Economic Court, now confirmed by the Madrid TSJ, the deductions that were applied to the liquidations did not proceed since they were personal expenses of the sole partner of the company, that is, Miguel Bosé.

Among the invoices whose deduction the Tax Agency denied for being Bosé’s personal expenses are those related to physiotherapy treatments and physical training, “which are not related to the activity carried out by the company (Costanagua) as they are obvious personal expenses of his partner and sole administrator “, says the sentence.

Nor does it admit those of the invoices related to the purchase of Iberian products (ham and loin) since, apart from the fact that the expenses of representation and gifts are not deductible, there is no evidence of any relationship of those expenses with the income of the company, he emphasizes sentence.

There are others that correspond to the installation of a closed circuit domotic television that, says the court, “it is clear, once again, that it was a security service provided in the private home” of Bosé, without having any relation to the activity of the society.

And the fact that Costanagua “states that he had rented a part of the house for his activity, is only reflected in a private lease document with the effectiveness and proof that said documents have (…) and, in any case, it would deal with services used simultaneously to satisfy private and professional needs, “the court maintains.

Regarding the expenses associated with the “renting” of an Audi vehicle, it indicates that its usual driver was Ignacio Palau Medina, (the artist’s ex-partner) “without clarifying in the lawsuit what was the employment relationship with the plaintiff entity and what their functions in the company consisted of, and without stating payroll or means of payment thereof “. And as the Tax Agency points out, the vehicle’s insurance policy was listed as “private” use.

The rest of the expenses related to repairs of a Toyota vehicle and another Mercedes brand are also rejected, since there is no record that they were for the activity of the company since the professional trips of Bosé and his musicians were made with rental vehicles with driver .

No professional activity
The TSJM indicates that Costanagua did not carry out any professional activity and it was carried out by Bosé, since all the contracts made by it had the purpose of developing its professional activity and were carried out exclusively on the basis of that activity.

Thus, the sentence adds, that activity could have been carried out directly by the natural person, “without the need to interpose any company for it, inasmuch as the company did not provide any professional activity.”

“It is evident that there is no legal prohibition in relation to the provision of professional services through commercial companies, but what the rule does not cover is that a company is used to bill the services that a natural person performs, with the sole purpose to reduce the direct taxation of the professional “, he highlights.

As announced at the beginning of the month, the board of directors of Sareb , the bad bank that received the toxic real estate assets of the banks rescued in the previous crisis, has unanimously approved this Wednesday the appointment of its hitherto CEO, Javier García del Río , as the new president to replace Jaime Echegoyen , who submitted his voluntary resignation “for personal reasons” three weeks ago .

García del Río, who joined the company in February 2020 as deputy general director to the president and was appointed CEO in October, is an industrial engineer from the ETS de Ingenieros de Sevilla and has “extensive experience in the recovery and implementation of value of non-performing loan portfolios (NPL) and real estate assets, “according to the company in a note

“At Sareb we face this new stage with renewed responsibility in order to maximize the capacity to generate cash and pay off the debt guaranteed by the State . We will continue to pursue this goal with expert management and efficient spending.

This economic objective must be compatible with the social utility of our activity, obtained through the retail sale – to individuals and industrial companies – of our assets, and also the development of partnerships in the field of affordable and social housing ”, the executive

On the other hand, the Sareb shareholders’ meeting held this Wednesday has approved the 2020 accounts (1,073 million euros in losses, 13.3% more) and has given the green light to the conversion into capital of 1,430 million euros of subordinated debt to avoid being in a negative equity situation. After this operation, the firm’s own resources stood at 587 million euros of capital at the end of 2020.

Accumulated losses
The change at the top comes a few weeks after Eurostat, the community statistical office, forced Spain to include Sareb within the public sector. This has raised public debt by about 35,000 million euros and has caused the financial aid item for the 2020 deficit to rise to 9,878 million .

As a consequence of this, the Government is negotiating with the other shareholders of the firm, mainly banks, to take full control of the company, of which the State is the first shareholder but with a 45.9% stake, according to what he advanced ‘ The confidential’.

The company accumulates losses in all its years of life, despite the fact that the Rajoy Executive assured that it would have an average annual profitability of 13%. From the beginning it was proven to be false .

The main problem is that the more than 200,000 assets he received were valued by Oliver Wyman at an excessive price, which benefited the nationalized banks, since it avoided causing an equity hole even greater than they already suffered, but it has hurt the bad bank , which has been unable to sell its loans and properties at market prices to avoid suffering even greater losses.

The current government, in fact, has opened the door to extend its life beyond the closing in 2027 to prevent the bill for public accounts from rising further.