The accounts show that in 2013 the Balearics contributed over 1,500 million euros more to the state than it got back under the system of regional distribution. This equated to almost six per cent of regional GDP.
Vice-President Biel Barceló describes these as "astronomical amounts", which once more indicate the need for a new model of financing. The situation is so harmful to the Balearics, Barceló believes, that there has to be "radical change" and not just mere tinkering with the current model.
The regional administration wants a system based on fiscal federalism and it will be presenting a new document to demand the payment of 1,250 million euros of state investment that was lost when José Ramón Bauzá was president because no agreement was signed.
The financing deficit, typified by the 2013 figure but a consistent factor each year, would go towards much-needed infrastructure improvements. Barceló and finance minister Catalina Cladera today identified projects such as water supply and purification as well as schools and health centres. Barceló believes the method of financing calculation "masks realities and is clearly against the interests of the Balearics".
Cladera insisted that Madrid pays the 80 million euros for roads that it promised last year. If this isn't forthcoming, the Balearic government runs the risk of exceeding the permitted budgetary deficit for 2016. She repeated a charge that the regional government has been making recently: that the Rajoy administration is blackmailing regions into rebelling and demanding the formation of a new government in order to end its current interim nature.
Both ministers added that if there is no improvement to financing, the government will consider taking action in the courts in order to demand payment of state investment.
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Barceló should understand socialism and how it works. Rich automomies like Madrid, Catalonia & Baleares always finance the poor regions like Andalucia, Extremadura etc. Brought in by Felipe Gonzales and never changed even by centre right governments over the decades. It is a rebellion by the people to the Franco years. Get used to it. It will never change.
Sounds just like the UK sending more billions to the EU, than they received in return. Perhaps a Spanish/Balearic's A Referendum is required. Why should the Balearic's finance Spain's billions of debt, borrowed from the EU Central Bank.