The Government approves the draft Transparency Law, a rule that culminates the concept of transparency in its entiretyl

• The law has three main objectives: to guarantee the transparency of the administration; to promote citizen participation; and to facilitate the accountability of the actions and initiatives developed in compliance with each government program
• Olatz Garamendi: “this law is intended to be another instrument of engagement with the public in order to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of public policies, as well as a tool with which to generate citizens’ greater identification with those policies”

The spokesperson for the Basque Government and Minister for Culture and Language Policy, Bingen Zupiria, appeared at the usual press conference after the Governing Council meeting, together with the Minister of Public Governance and Self-Government, Olatz Garamendi.

DRAFT TRANSPARENCY LAW OF THE BASQUE COUNTRY

Minister Garamendi appeared today at the press conference to give an account of the draft Law on Transparency of the Basque Country, approved today. As he explained, this bill, promoted and worked on by the Department of Public Governance and Self-Government, is the culmination of the concept of transparency in its entirety and its objective is the transparency of the administration before the citizens, to stimulate the participation of the citizens in public affairs, and to facilitate the accountability in real time of the actions and initiatives developed in compliance with each government programme. This regulation includes greater active publicity obligations than those that currently exist for public administrations to report on the decisions they take and how they adopt them, how services are organised and who are the persons responsible for their actions, or anything related to the use of public funds.

Likewise, Minister Garamendi explained that this law creates the Basque Transparency Authority-Gardena, as a guarantee body before which complaints may be filed when access to information is denied or when the information provided is not satisfactory. The European whistleblower protection and anti-corruption system will also be implemented through Gardena. “This law is intended to be another instrument of commitment to citizenship with the aim of improving the effectiveness and efficiency of public policies, as well as a tool with which to generate citizens’ greater identification with those policies,” concluded the Minister.

AGREEMENTS OF THE GOVERNING COUNCIL

As usual, the spokesperson, Bingen Zupiria, provided information on other issues discussed and approved in the Governing Council meeting.

First of all, the spokesman explained that, as stated in the Public Contracts Law, the Government has been informed at today's meeting of the Annual Contracting Plan of the Administration of the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country for next year. This plan calls for 223 public contracts with an estimated value of €292 million and includes their programming with the different departments. In the words of the spokesman: “the Public Sector Contracts Law states that it will be the obligation of public sector entities to programme the contracting activity they have to develop during a budget year, so they have to make their plan known in advance as regards at least those contracts with a harmonized regulation, that is, those exceeding the thresholds of budgets and which are subject to the European Directives”.

The spokesman also announced that the Basque Government and the Chambers of Commerce of Araba, Bizkaia and Gipuzkoa are going to sign a collaboration agreement for the implementation of a preferential employment EPSV for self-employed or self-employed people. “This group usually contributes in what is called the first pillar, i.e., the minimum, so they receive reduced benefits and pensions,” said Zupiria. Therefore, the implementation of this EPSV aims to promote a complementary social security system for the self-employed that is efficient, adjusted in management costs and with early incorporation of workers. In order to collaborate in its implementation, the Basque Government has agreed to grant a subsidy of 100,000 Euros to the Basque Chambers of Commerce.

The spokesman then gave an account of several educational programmes approved by the Governing Council, all of them related to Science and Research. Zupiria highlighted two. Firstly, the order approved in the field of research of excellence for the execution of basic and/or applied research projects in the period 2024-2026. This programme is for a total amount of 800,000 Euros and is aimed at strengthening the Community Science, Technology and Innovation System and contributing to the development of specific basic and applied research projects through lines of applied or technological research of quality and scientific and technological interest. Secondly approval has been given to allocate 200,000 Euros for the organization of congresses and meetings in the field of scientific research and the accredited agents of the Basque Science, Technology and Innovation Network, whatever their category, may be beneficiaries.

Finally, Zupiria referred to the issues dealt with in the Governing Council meeting regarding the Department of Culture and Linguistic Policy, saying that the 2022 report of Elebide, the Service for the Guarantee of Linguistic Rights, has been approved. According to this report, in 2022, 212 incidents related to language rights violations were recorded in this service, 65 fewer than the previous year. Of the total number of incidents processed, 178 were complaints, of which 171 (96%) referred to the infringement of the right to use the Basque language and in 7 cases, to the violation of the use of Spanish. Of all these complaints, 78% referred to violations in the public sphere and 21% were in the private sector. “I want to comment on a point that has to do with the solution that was given to each of these complaints and, in this sense it should be noted that almost 60% of the 178 complaints were solved in a satisfactory way and 32% were closed without being resolved because the complainant did not respond to the notifications sent by Elebide. Finally, 14 complaints (7.8%) were not resolved because the citizen did not consider the response given by the entity complained about to be satisfactory,” explained Zupiria.

During questions, in reference to the Education Law, the spokesman pointed out that “the document consists of 121 articles that have been worked on and agreed one by one with the different political parties; a small modification in the explanatory memorandum is what has now generated the discrepancies; it is legitimate to want to highlight the differences, but it is not understandable to vote against a law because of discrepancies in a sentence that appears in the explanatory memorandum”.

In relation to the transfers, Minister Garamendi explained that her department has been in contact with the recently formed government to move forward with the devolutions contemplated in the agreement reached.