Is singular financing starting to roll?
BarcelonaThis Monday saw the launch of the unique financing project championed by the ERC (Republican Workers' Party) and accepted by the PSOE (Spanish Socialist Workers' Party) within the framework of Salvador Illa's investiture as president of the Generalitat (Catalan Government). The text agreed upon and signed by both parties is full of good intentions, always qualified by the call for the extensibility of the agreement to other regional tax administrations. The objective is for the tax administration of the Generalitat to progressively assume responsibility for managing personal income tax and for personal income tax returns for the 2025 fiscal year to be submitted to the Catalan Tax Agency (ATC), with the possibility of using the digital identification key established by the Generalitat (idCAT), and for the AEAT to be able to make progress, particularly with the verification of the correct application of regional regulations and, in particular, of the deductions approved by Parliament."
A careful reading of the agreement signed by both parties, the Spanish government seems to have given little. We could say that what was signed would be tax collection "practices." The introductory part is more encouraging, but it is also clear that the Ministry of Finance, represented by the Minister of Territorial Policy, is moving forward with the handbrake on, more attentive to "what people will say" (the autonomous communities themselves and those of the PP) than to compliance with the pact with ERC. A cold reading of the agreement does not You can't interpret it as a revolution or a coup d'état, but rather as the opening of a possibility, always within the framework of the powers approved by the Catalan Parliament, to collect the portion of personal income tax derived from powers already transferred or legislated by the Parliament. We are far from singular financing.
However, should we boo the Catalan interlocutors? Or should we congratulate them? It's difficult to congratulate them in light of the agreement, but, probably, in the current situation of general political fragility, the only way to break the fire of personal income tax collection through the ATC is to start somewhere, however modest, and for Pedro Sánchez's government to approve it with its own votes and those of its investiture partners.
However, if it is approved and its implementation progresses, the wording of the agreement is so little threatening to Spain's unitary essence that it could survive an absolute majority of the Popular Party. The Generalitat should take the opportunity to open up as many high-level tax inspection and administration positions as possible, to take the leap that has never been achieved in the muscle and qualifications required to have its own tax administration.
