Court of Auditors did not question external action in 2016

BarcelonaThe Foreign Affairs case on the Court of Auditors analyses with a magnifying glass the action of the Generalitat abroad between 2011 and 2017 and questions trips, conferences and studies that in their opinion have to do with the Catalan independence bid and involve irregular spending. A full-fledged questioning of what the Catalan government can do that leads the court to claim more than five million euros to about thirty former officials. However, not every time the Court of Audit has analysed Catalonia's external action has it questioned it, given that there is a previous report from July 2016 in which, after analysing the activity of all the autonomous regions, including Catalonia, the body does not warn of any specific activity that it considers suspicious.

This document, available on the Court of Audit's website and dating from 22 July 2016 -already in the midst of the Catalan independence bid-, x-rays the foreign activity of the autonomous communities, commissioned by the joint Congress of Deputies-Senate committee for relations with the Court of Audit with the aim of analysing expenditure in relation to support for internationalisation and foreign investment. The structure of the report, unlike the audit of Catalonia's foreign activity at the end of 2019 and the origin of the current case, is much more generic and only gives an overview of the policies of all the autonomous communities.

It begins with a description of the parts that make up the abroad action of the communities - foreign promotion, development cooperation, tourism promotion and business internationalisation - with the associated expenditure, the institutional structure that develops it and some of the specific actions. Further on, it analyses specific projects of the communities in depth and, in the case of Catalonia, it chooses the lines of aid announced by ACCIÓ to help the internationalisation of companies.

The report describes, in the area of foreign promotion, that Catalonia concentrates foreign activity in the Presidency, since most of the activity is carried out by the head of the executive -as in the other autonomous regions-. At that time, there was no Foreign Department (it was created in 2016) and the activity abroad depended on the then president Artur Mas and the ministerFrancesc Homs through a secretariat in the Presidency. The report also notes that at that time the Generalitat had 25 headquarters of foreign delegations and that, along with the Basque Country, it opposed negotiating agreements with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to integrate into the Spanish diplomatic missions. In this sense, it remarks that, despite the economic crisis, the delegations abroad were not reduced, but new ones were opened in Italy, Austria, Morocco, Santa Fe and Portugal. Even so, it does not question that it has the power to do so.

In the field of foreign promotion subsidies, it lists that it gives money to entities and to the community of Catalans abroad, but does not point out irregularities - the analysis is general - which the 2019 report does note when analysing subsidies; for example, one from 2012. Another difference is that the first report lists the Generalitat's Perpignan house as another entity within the foreign action, while the last one recommends its suppression.

Recommendations

After auditing the activity of all the autonomous regions, the court makes a series of recommendations to the State focused on establishing a control of the autonomous regions' foreign action and recentralisation. According to the document, studies should be carried out to assess the efficiency of maintaining the headquarters abroad independently or their integration into the state ones, in addition to increasing the "joint strategic planning" between the Spanish government and the communities with the aim of making "coherent" policies. It makes a proposal to improve cooperation, which it believes is lacking with a regional sectoral conference, and calls for the forum to be endowed with decision-making and control powers, with a commitment to multilateralism over bilateralism.

Last day to file an appeal

The 2016 report covers at least three years (from 2011 to 2014), which the Court of Audit has subsequently re-analysed. In the current case, the Court is investigating former president Mas, former minister Andreu Mas-Colell, Homs and former auditor general Mireia Vidal. For this reason, some of the defendants have included the report in their pleadings before the court - they have been rejected - and plan to put it on the table again when the trial takes place, probably next year. What the defences can still do is to appeal the bail of 5.4 million euros before 21 July. This is the last chance to avoid having to deposit the capital, either through the system devised by the Generalitat, the Caixa de Solidaritat or their own assets.