The Generalitat of Catalonia is about to resolve what will be the largest public tender of the legislature: the urgent and non-urgent medical transport management service. To this mega contract 2.4 billionwhich has been divided into 10 lots, 12 companies have chosen. The ambulance competition will approve the budget for the period 2025-2030 and multinationals, family companies and local companies have applied to him.
Precisely, the conditions of the previous contest, presented almost a decade ago and which has been run twice, have traditionally pitted large business groups against smaller companies, which lamented the difficulties in accessing the contest. From the Government It is noted that improvements have been articulated in the process, among which it is worth prioritizing the quality of the service over the economic offer, in addition to reducing the contract to five years, half of what was established until now.
The unions reject the proposal, as long as there is no progress in the internalization of the service
Furthermore, to limit the concentration of awards, companies will only be able to obtain three lots per operation. Even so, the unions and worker representatives reject the proposal, as long as there is no progress in the internalization of the service and the working conditions of the staff are equated to those of the employees of the Medical Emergency System (SEM).
Just after the last regional elections in the Parliament of Catalonialast May, the Catalan Court of Public Service Contracts suspended the tender for the ambulance management service, responding to a challenge from the Catalan Association of Ambulance Employers (ACEA). The employers argued that the budget, exceeding 2,000 million, “was insufficient and caused losses”, in addition to highlighting other erroneous calculations, such as the average speeds of the vehicles, the price of the bases or the discounts on the purchase of fleets. . ACEA states that “the conditions are not supported by any objective report.”
The Save Ambulàncies Platform points out that 90% of Catalan ambulances are managed by multinationals and private companies
Instead, the Save Ambulàncies Platform focuses on the need to advance the bill on the internalization of medical transportation. The group points out that of the more than 1,300 ambulances in Catalonia, More than 90% are managed by multinationals and private companies that, through the subcontracting of the service by the Generalitat, “their priority is to do business with an essential service.”
Contract inspection
Salvem les Ambulàncies denounces the deplorable state of the vehicles, the obsolescence of materials, non-compliance with training and the job insecurity of the workers. 5,000 professionals in the sector. Thus, it warns about “poor healthcare management and lack of oversight of bankruptcy breaches”, which leads the successful bidder companies to be far from offering a quality service. In the absence of the publication of the tender contract, the entity raises the importance that “the public resources allocated are used to guarantee quality medical transport and that such a high budget allocation would have to be correctly monitored.”
In the previous legislature, Salvem les Ambulàncies and representatives of the union CGT Catalunya presented the reality of the sector to the deputies of the Parliament of Catalonia. One of the most illustrative data is the comparative grievance that exists between 10% of public vehicles and the remaining 90% private. For this reason, they argue that “the shortest path to equalizing the working conditions of professionals is the internalization of the service.” In this case, they require that the Generalitatin recent decades, has not been able to reverse the poor management of the awarding firms, which has ended up affecting the service received by users.
One of the solutions proposed is that the Government, through the CatSalutassume the management of the entire urgent and non-urgent transport service, in addition to the staff. To support this, they assure that “if we have a public fire department, if we have a Mossos d’Esquadra public, why don’t we also deserve to have health transportation, in its urgent and non-urgent modalities, that is also public?”
Essential public service
The union CGT Catalunya points out that after a sectoral negotiation process of almost a decade, which has ended without a consensus between the employers and the representatives, it is now necessary to reinforce the salary and labor equalization mechanisms, which were left out of the previous ones. Budgets of the Generalitat. For this reason, it urges “to solve the lack of political will with the recovery of essential public services without involving the interests of private companies or the internalization of the same as stated in the initial bill.”
Precisely, this Monday a meeting is scheduled between the Minister of the Interior, Núria Parlonand members of the works council of the 112 of Reus and of the Free Zonethe emergency telephone number, to address the internalization of the service. More than two years ago, the same PSC, party that governs the Generalitat, presented a parliamentary proposal for a resolution to internalize 112 in the shortest possible time.
In Catalonia112 is a privatized service in which workers are governed by the labor agreement. telemarketing. In addition, workers at the Reus centers and the Free Trade Zone have been on strike for a year in protest against working conditions. The staff representatives comment that “the fact of dispensing with the intermediary company is a saving for the Administration and puts an end to the desire for profit in emergencies that causes not enough workers to be hired.”
In both cases, the actors involved reaffirm that public management and the possibility of having their own agreement are guarantees of quality emergencies. The objective is to guarantee excellence in the quality of care
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