New chapter in the confrontation between the president of Airef, Cristina Herrero, and the Minister of Social Security, José Luis Escrivá. From Santander, Herrero has affirmed that “it is not good” for an Airef president to automatically become a government minister -as in the case of Escrivá- because he casts a shadow of doubt on the independence of the institution.
He has said it in the framework of the APIE seminar that is being held this week at the UIMP in Santander. Airef is the Independent Authority for Fiscal Responsibility and is in charge of analyzing the policies of public administrations.
“When that step occurs, in some way we felt that we had to reaffirm our independence,” he detailed.
Herrero’s statements come after Escrivá harshly criticized the latest Airef report on the operation of the minimum vital income (IMV) last week. In that work, it was noted that these resources were reaching far fewer people than those who needed them. Specifically, it was denounced that the IMV only reached 284,000 households in 2022, 35% of those who could receive it.
The president of Airef has regretted that in his criticisms the Minister of Social Security made “value judgments” such as when he pointed out that the institution thought it was wrong for people to leave the IMV.
Regarding the economic situation, Herrero has predicted that this second quarter of the year Spain’s GDP will exceed the level prior to the pandemic, thus leaving behind the covid pothole. In her speech, the president of Airef recalled that the institution “breaks the information symmetry and citizens can be more informed and governments discipline themselves.”
