August 22, 2023.- The Council of Ministers has approved an agreement that modifies the limits established in article 47 of the General Budget Law, to acquire spending commitments from future years, in order to enable the Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda, to compensate Renfe Viajes, S.M.E., S.A., of the public service obligations, pending liquidation.
On December 18, 2018, the holder of the then called Ministry of Public Works signed with the President of Renfe Viajes, S.M.E., S.A. the contract for the provision of public passenger transport services by rail of ‘Neighbourhoods’, ‘Conventional Medium Distance’, ‘High Speed Medium Distance (Avant)’ and ‘Metric Width’, competence of the General Administration of the State, subject to public service obligations in the period 2018-2027, through which an expense for said application of 9,693,759,000 euros was authorized.
This contract was modified by several addenda. At present, the Monitoring Committee has approved the provisional liquidation of the financial year 2022, for a total of 1,122.10 million euros, exceeding by 170.52 million euros the amount foreseen in the contract without investment in rolling stock and 195.37 million euros with investment in rolling stock.
Law 31/2022, of December 23, on General State Budgets for the year 2023, in several additional provisions declares new public service obligations and establishes the obligation to modify the contract to collect the regime of provision of the new services. These public service obligations are as follows:
- Proximity rail services, for a period of 3 years as a pilot experience, extendable to the entire term of the contract, subject to the agreement of the Council of Ministers, if certain levels of use are met:
- Palma del Río and Villa del Río.
- Illescas and Fuenlabrada/Humanes.
- Malaga-El Jet-Caminito del Rey.
- Murcia-Cartagena.
- Medina of the Field-Alicante-Palencia.
The provision of these services represents an increase over the expected compensation of EUR 33,813,716 over the three years.
- New medium-distance rail services provided over the high-speed network for recurrent passengers using multi-journey certificates: Madrid-Palencia; Madrid-Zamora; León-Valladolid; Burgos-Madrid; León-Palencia; Burgos-Valladolid; Ourense-Zamora; Palencia-Valladolid; Huesca-Zaragoza; León-Segovia; Segovia-Zamora; Palencia-Segovia; Medina del Campo-Zamora.
The provision of such services entails an addition on the expected compensation of 12,716,302 euros until the end of the contract.
On the other hand, Royal Decree-Law 20/2022, of 27 December, on measures to respond to the economic and social consequences of the Ukrainian War and to support the reconstruction of the island of La Palma and other situations of vulnerability, establishes in article 55, as new public service obligations, the services between Murcia and Alicante provided by the new line of high benefits, the Contract having to be modified in order to collect the regime of provision of the service, with effects from the date of start of the provision of the services. The provision of such services does not entail an increase over the anticipated compensation.
In order to provide budgetary coverage for Addendum No. 5, additional requirements are proposed to the expenditure already committed in the amount of 213,906,000 euros.