The Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, Ángel Víctor Torres, has chaired the 44th Joint Commission of State-Galicia Transfers in which the transfer of functions and services from the State Administration to the Autonomous Community of Galicia has been formalized in terms of planning and management of the coast, which will become effective from July 1.
Minister Torres has appeared together with the president of the Xunta, Alfonso Rueda, in the Raxoi Palace, and has stressed that this transfer is due to “the will for dialogue” between the two administrations, “something I thank President Rueda”. For the minister, taking into account also that the last transfer of competences to Galicia was formalized in 2008, “days like this are very important”.
This plenary session of the Joint Transfer Commission is the second one held with Galicia in the last three years, being the previous one in 2022, to address issues in the field of financing.
Torres stressed that his department will continue to work with Galicia and the rest of the CCAA in the transfer of competences “because we believe that greater self-government results in the improvement of the services provided to citizens. And this transfer, which has been made under the same conditions - no more and no less - than other territories that have demanded competition, is an example of full confidence in the State of the autonomies. We believe in the state of autonomies.”
Transferred functions and services
Among the transferred competences are authorizations for seasonal uses on beaches and in the territorial sea, authorizations in areas of transit servitude and access to the sea or the monitoring, processing and imposition of sanctions.
With regard to the functions and services reserved by the State Administration, they include the setting of the amount of the royalties for the use of the public marine-terrestrial domain; the rescue of demanial concessions when required by a reason of general interest linked to its scope; or the sanctioning power derived from its competences, and which do not refer to the infractions for non-compliance that correspond to the Autonomous Community of Galicia.
The agreement also establishes a series of forms of cooperation between the two administrations on the construction or modification of ports and transport routes; on the reports to be issued from the Ministry of Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge on the plans and rules of coastal management; or on works of general interest.
The total effective cost of the transfer exceeds 1.2 million euros.
Dialogue with all CCAAs regional
Minister Torres said that the Government of Spain will continue to work with the will to dialogue with the Autonomous Communities, “as it has done so far, with very positive results”, referring to the reduction of litigation that has been experienced in the legislatures of Pedro Sánchez.
The number of direct appeals filed has been reduced by 69% (from 124 to 39) compared to the previous stage; and the number of appeals filed after the negotiation allowed by Article 33.2 of the Organic Law of the Constitutional Court has fallen by 60% (from 114 to 45).
As for the results of the negotiations applying the 33.2 LOCT, in the more than six years that Sánchez has been governing, 306 agreements have been reached with the Autonomous Communities, 112 more agreements than those achieved in the previous six years.
Of the 306 agreements, 56 have been reached in the last year and a half (in this XV Legislature), two of them being total agreements with the Autonomous Community of Galicia regarding the autonomous laws of Food Quality (June 16, 2024) and Fiscal and Administrative Measures (September 3, 2024).
Funds processed for local Galician entities
In other areas, from the area of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, 1.6 million grants have been processed to repair Galician municipal infrastructures affected by disasters since July 2021. And the PRTR grants managed by the Ministry of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory for the modernization and digital transformation of Galician local entities amount to 23.4 million euros.