Andalusia is the third worst treated Spanish community by the current regional financing system that expired in 2014, together with the Valencian Community and Murcia, with an adjusted population index of 95.6 out of one hundred compared to 116.9 of the best financed (Cantabria), and, furthermore, it is one of those that has fallen the most -3.8 points- from the 2002 system to the one in force since 2009. These are data from the report The evolution of the financing of the autonomous communities of the common system, published by the Foundation for Applied Economics Studies (FEDEA).
This is the reality of autonomy, as is the case in the Valencian Community, which continues to draw on the Autonomous Liquidity Fund, FLA, in order to cover the cost of its social services, its Education and its Health. With the aggravating circumstance that this underfinancing, which is covered by the FLA debt, is increasing the accumulated debt year after year: almost 38,000 million euros. This also limits the possibility of the regional government to resort to private financing.
The seriousness of the financial situation in Andalusia, however, has not entered, for the time being, in the electoral campaign for the 19J elections, which is surprising. It could be seen last Monday in the first electoral debate between the candidates for the presidency of the Andalusian Government: neither Juan Manuel Moreno Bonilla nor Juan Espadas made hardly any reference to this issue which, as a contrast, is the fundamental axis of the Valencian claim Ximo Puig in front of the Spanish Government.
If we go back to the recent past, this has not always been the case. For example, in September 2021, Bonilla and Ximo Puig held a summit in Seville exclusively to talk about regional financing. From that meeting, a tacit agreement was reached between the two autonomies: to pressure the Government so that the population criterion adjusted to respond to the needs of two populated regions and whose financing does not correspond to the number of inhabitants they have and the services that are lend. The harmony between the two regional leaders seemed complete.
Weeks later, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, still as Galician president, called a meeting with the presidents of Asturias, La Rioja, Aragón, Castilla-La Mancha, Castilla y León, Cantabria and Extremadura, to defend the current calculation of the adjusted population based on to the cost of services, the dispersion of the population and ageing. It was an alternative proposal of popular and socialist leaders against the Bonilla and Ximo Puig tandem. And it was also a way of putting pressure on the Spanish government not to modify the current criteria of adjusted population.
At that time, Pablo Casado presided over the PP, and continued to defend the regional financing model promoted by José María Aznar, which continued to harm the most populated regions. And at the end of last year, María Jesús Montero, Minister of Finance and former head of this portfolio in the executive of Susana Díaz, launched an adjusted population proposal that was rejected by Andalusia and the Valencian Community. Bonilla and Ximo Puig also agreed on this. But the fall of Casado and the rise of Feijóo to the leadership of the national PP have completely changed Bonilla’s position.
Everything points to the fact that the popular Andalusian candidate does not want to open a debate that would inevitably force Feijóo to speak out, to position himself on an issue in which, as Galician president, he kept a stark distance from Bonilla’s positions and which now, as national leader , of the popular must modulate. That is to say, it does not seem that the president of the PP wants this issue to enter the campaign and, even less, that it could condition his way to La Moncloa.
Bonilla’s change of attitude with regard to financing has been, for example, a problem for Ximo Puig, since the Valencian president hoped that the Valencian and Andalusian alliance would be sufficient to put pressure on the Government with this objective. Now Ximo Puig is, de facto, alone in this claim, which is causing him quite a few problems in the face of opposition to his government in the Valencian Community.
The case of Juan Espadas also has its own reading. The socialist candidate knows, as well as the Valencian socialists, that Pedro Sánchez does not want to open the melon of the new regional financing model. Since Montero’s proposal was made public, no other step has been taken in this direction, and it seems that this issue is not going to be addressed in the current legislature. Changing the financing requires a national agreement between the PP and the PSOE which, at the moment, seems impossible.
More striking seems the position of the Minister of Finance. As advisor on this matter in the Andalusian executive, she was very vindictive in this matter with Mariano Rajoy in the government. Her conversations with the former head of the Valencian Treasury, Vicent Soler, revolved for months about how to pressure the popular. But María Jesús Montero seems to have forgotten this story, and her role is to defuse any tension in this matter and leave it for better times, which never seem to come.
If there are no changes in the days remaining until 19J, Andalusian underfunding will not be part of the electoral battle. Only Por Andalucía and Adelante Andalucía highlight this problem in their first agenda item, but the two great political forces in battle seem to have agreed not to hurt each other with the financing. The case of Vox cannot be taken into account, they want to end the regional system.
