The Parliament In October, it approved the budget of the Catalan Chamber for 2022, which advanced in a progressive reduction of the compensation (the well-known allowances) of the deputies so that they are included in the salary. Six months later, already at the halfway point of the accounts in force, the parliamentary groups still have not closed an agreement that would make it effective, for which the Ombudsman of Accounts and Treasury of the Catalan Chamber has alerted the members of the Table that they should make a modification of the budget so as not to incur accounting illegalities and a breach of regulations.
The stumbling block between the parties remains the same: who should assume the taxation of personal income tax and whether or not the deputies should lose purchasing power. At the moment in which compensation for travel and displacement expenses (which range between 16,975.56 and 23,895.12 euros per year) are incorporated into parliamentarians’ salaries, they are subject to personal income tax. To prevent the deputies from losing part of their net remuneration, the initial proposal was that this retention be covered by the Parliament, which would mean, according to sources in the Chamber, a cost of 1.1 million euros for their coffers.
The rejection of the CUP and the ‘comuns’ To this idea, he opened some denials to three bands -PSC, ERC and Junts- that have studied various ways to cover a part and minimize the impact on salary, although for now they remain stuck and without an agreement. Hence, the Table, meeting this Tuesday, has endorsed by a majority -all, except the CUP- that 815,000 euros go from being counted in the budgetary chapter of complementary to compensation.
no sign of agreement
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Parliamentary sources assume that there will be no agreement, at least for now, and they are already forced to make a decision regarding the 2023 budgets. The CUP disfigures the rest of the groups that have not made a decision and discard their proposal, which happens by not charging these allowances (which are accounted for according to the trips) and that it be the deputies themselves who assume the taxation of personal income tax. However, this is not bought by the majority groups, because they consider that it is unfeasible to have to go to the cash register each time it is spent on specific trips and that the salary of the deputies must remain the same: 2,921.8 euros per month.
No deputy consulted considers that the decision on allowances is going to be unsettled this budget year due to various factors. First, due to the impact that the well-known licenses by age had on the image of the institution, a kind of early retirement for officials who had been in the Chamber for more than 15 years and who were over 60 years of age, which are on the way to extinction. Second, because after six months, the debate can be postponed with the modification of the budget structure already made. And, third, because at this moment they see it as politically difficult to justify that the institution dedicates 1.1 million euros to taxation without impacting the salary of parliamentarians. The question is whether PSC, ERC and Junts reach an intermediate agreement, which does not greatly affect their honorable members or the Catalan Chamber.