The Court of Auditors has produced a report highlighting the need for more scrutiny of foundations linked to political parties. In it he denounces that more than half of the foundations audited in the last analyzed years 2018 and 2019 did not report their finances within the legally required deadline or simply did not submit any data. “Of the 51 companies audited in 2018 – according to the report – 23 presented the financial statements on time (before the 30 accounts “, picks up the text. So compared to the 23 that complied with their legal obligations, a majority of 28 did so others did not.In 2019, 16 companies submitted their accounts on time, 26 after the deadline and 9 failed to file their annual accounts.Therefore, 35 violations and 16 regular measures were registered.
The President of the Court of Auditors, Enriqueta Chicano, appears on Tuesday before the mixed commission responsible for this institution in Congress to deliver her report, which concludes that “public funding accounts for 72% of the resources (of the parties) and private funding accounts for 28%”. According to the court, this situation is unbalanced and can endanger the economic viability of various organizations – which it does not specify – by making them overly dependent on their electoral contribution. Sources from the Court of Auditors themselves explain that in this appearance they have chosen to offer general data, without referring to specific parties, in order not to intervene in the electoral campaign for the local and regional elections on May 28, which will be carried out in the Control Authority It already considered to be in full development, although it has not officially started yet.
Using data from 2017, the report highlights “the advisability” of balancing the weight that public and private sources must represent “in overall funding” to avoid over-reliance on public source revenues. And this because such income “is subject to considerable fluctuations depending on the election result and can become a risk of insolvency situations”.
The report also states, using data from 2017, that “public funding consisted of ordinary operating grants of €170.67 million”. This includes 2.71 million euros in security costs and 5.72 million euros in campaign costs. The reported private funds amounted to a total of 67.73 million euros, which include, among other things, donations from officials, membership fees and contributions as well as donations.
Regarding compliance with the duties to control the activities of foundations and associations affiliated with political parties, the report highlights that in 2018 and 2019 only about a third of the audited entities submitted the audit report. In 2018, 18 out of 51 companies (35%) presented their annual accounts and in the following year 16 out of 51 (31%).
On the other hand, according to the information provided by the Ministry of Interior, as of December 31, 2019, “only 18 of the foundations and 3 of the entities related to or dependent on the political parties audited had registered in the specific section of the register of parties”.
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The report recommends that the Home Office “continue to update the register of political parties” to obtain a list of political parties that are required to present their accounts to the court. The regulator had already alerted the ministry headed by Fernando Grande-Markaska that a number of parties had not spent all the grants they had received to cover security expenses and had therefore had to repay the unused amounts.
The list of organizations that found themselves in this situation included Podemos (229,861.84 euros), Izquierda Unida (32,495.97 euros), Barcelona en Comú (24,726.51 euros), Esquerra Unida i Alternativa (12,615.36 euros) , Compromís (14,347.04 euros), Anova (12,969.61 euros). ), Nueva Canarias (6,848.56 euros), Aragonese Party (8,757.18 euros), Unión del Pueblo Navarro (3,807.74 euros), Forum (3,046.10 euros) and EH Bildu (45.71 euros). Some of these parties, like Podemos, have already initiated the return in 2021 via entry into the treasury.