The Congress of Deputies opens the piggy bank to allocate part of its funds to the victims of the DANA that devastated several municipalities in Valencia last week. The Bureau of the Lower House unanimously approved this Tuesday to send 30 million euros for “direct aid” to those affected by the effects of the floods, which represents more than 13% of the total funds. which it holds for the day-to-day operation of the legislature and for emergency and unforeseen expenses.
Specifically, the disbursement will come out of two different pockets. 15 million will be taken from the so-called Congressional carryover fund, a piggy bank that now has a cushion of 109.2 million euros and in which the Lower House is saving year after year a part of its unspent budget and which is intended for emergencies and to provide liquidity in case of any unforeseen event. The remaining amount, another 15 million Euros, will come out of the Congress’ own budgets, which for this year amount to 110.4 million Euros.
Parliamentary sources explain that at the meeting of the Bureau of Congress on Tuesday it was also agreed by PSOE, PP and Sumar -the three parties represented in the body- that the deputies of the provinces affected by the DANA can carry out parliamentary activities from their own constituencies. with voting and telematic participation in the debate of tables and commissions. This brings back one of the practices that were implemented during the pandemic four years ago, something extraordinary considering that the Congress is very restrictive when it comes to permitting telematic voting to deputies.
This first amount of 30 million euros is in addition to the amount that the Government is expected to allocate in the coming hours, when it will approve a first package of emergency measures to alleviate the effects of the crisis. The Treasury has already confirmed that it will authorize to the Generalitat Valenciana to carry out all the urgent expenses it needs without any limit of resources.and also announced on Monday that the collection of the second payment of the income tax return will be postponed for all taxpayers in the province of Valencia. This measure will benefit some 200,000 taxpayers, but it does not imply a remission of the amount due. Only taxpayers with tax returns to be paid in and who have split the payment into two installments will be able to benefit from this measure.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Economy is working with the Insurance Compensation Consortium to attend to the tens of thousands of claims for the damages caused by the DANA. The latest data communicated by the Government speak of 46,000 claims filedof which 40% are already being processed. As announced by Minister Carlos Cuerpo on Sunday, the first payments will start arriving as of next week.