The Association of Directors and Managers in Social Services accuses the Region and ten more autonomies of “making cash” with the increase in state items
The Region of Murcia was one of the eleven autonomous communities that “made cash” in 2021 with the increase in the General State Budgets (PGE) for dependency, “relieving the regional coffers instead of improving care for dependent people”. This is one of the harsh conclusions drawn from the latest report of the State Association of Directors and Managers in Social Services, prepared with official data that the Intervention of each autonomous community sends to the Ministry of Social Affairs.
From these data it can be deduced that the communities that have cut expenses in dependency items are the Region of Murcia, the Canary Islands, Castilla y León, La Rioja, Galicia, Catalonia, Aragón, Navarra, Extremadura, the Basque Country and Castilla La Mancha. In the case of the Region, the decrease in spending on dependency aid was 1.95% in relation to the previous year.
Interanual variation
of regional spending (%)
Average spending
per person in 2021
State Association of Directors
and Managers in Social Services
Year-on-year change in regional spending (%)
Average spending per person in 2021
State Association of Directors and Managers in Social Services
In this sense, the director of the State Association of Directors and Managers in Social Services, José Manuel Ramírez, explained yesterday that the Region of Murcia received 15 million more from the State in 2021 to reverse cuts in dependency and reduce waiting lists, but the Government of Fernando López Miras cut the regional budget for these items by almost four million euros. Ramírez, in statements collected by Onda Cero, considered “deplorable and a real disaster” that the money that should have been dedicated to reducing the waiting lists has been allocated “to other needs.” Waiting lists that “remain high and with really unbearable waiting times for dependent people.”
The document highlights that the levels of average spending per beneficiary are “hardly compatible with the provision of adequate services”
As the report recalls, last year 46,300 people died on the dependency waiting lists, 18,356 people pending resolution of degree of dependency and 27,944 people pending resolution of benefit. Of those 46,300 people who died without being treated, 1,413 were registered in the Region of Murcia (881 dependents awaiting an assessment and 532 pending resolution of degree). Almost four people a day. The Region was one of the seven communities where dependency waiting lists increased last year, by 6.72%.
Investment ‘per capita’
Another “crucial” element that “should not be lost sight of” is that of the “pronounced territorial inequality”. The communities that invest the most in dependency per potentially dependent person and year are the Basque Country (2,310 euros), Extremadura (1,774) and Navarra (1,500), while Canary Islands (543) and Galicia (596) are at the bottom. The Region of Murcia is again placed in the caboose with an investment per potentially dependent person of less than one thousand euros (978), which places it as the fourth autonomous community that invests the least in this regard.
Parents of López Ambit recognize the work of the staff and focus their criticism on Imas
The presidency of the Association of Relatives and Tutors of the Julio López Ambit center for people with disabilities wanted to clarify yesterday that the criticisms made about the “serious problems” in the facilities focused on the new management and the Murcian Institute of Social Action (Imas ) and never in the “commendable work” of the workers, who are “the first to be harmed by the management of the center”. The template “works to ensure that users have the best quality of life possible, but if problems are not addressed, the situation can worsen.”
Another of the most worrying data in the report is that which refers to the average annual expenditure per beneficiary person, which was 8,196 euros at the national level. The Region of Murcia is once again below the average, with 1,200 euros less average annual expenditure per beneficiary person than the country average (6,898 euros), and in fifth position from the bottom, only ahead of Castilla y León , Andalusia, Galicia and the Canary Islands. These levels of spending, in the opinion of the directors and managers in Social Services, are “hardly compatible with the provision of adequate services for dependent people”. Expenditure in the Region of Murcia represents practically half of what is spent in communities such as the Basque Country (12,932 euros per year).
Likewise, public investment in dependency care amounted to 9,559 million euros in 2021. Of this amount, the autonomous communities financed 79.2%, with 7,566 million euros (0.57% more spending than in 2020 ). The state contribution stands at 20.8%, with 1,992 million euros, having increased by 44% compared to the previous year, which was 1,384 million euros. The Basque Country (88.16%), the Valencian Community (85.14%), Navarra (84%) and the Balearic Islands (83.69%) finance their dependency systems to a greater extent, while the Region of Murcia remains at 79 %.
Although the data offered by the Ministry of Finance confirm the figures contained in the report of the Association of Directors and Managers of Social Services, sources from the same Ministry insisted yesterday that “the data shows the increase in spending in these years by the Regional government, taking charge of more than 80% of the investment in dependency» (79%, according to the report). That percentage, according to the same sources, “is very far from the percentages established for the financing of the dependency in the 2006 law”, which forced the sharing of spending 50% between the communities and the State. Treasury denied yesterday that the Community “has made cash” with state funds.
The report also accuses the Ministry of “leaving 76 million euros of the budget approved last year unexecuted for dependency care”, and concludes that the objective of reducing the waiting list proposed by the Ministry’s Shock Plan “does not has been fulfilled”.
Marín: “The regional government has learned nothing from the pandemic”
The Regional Assembly will vote on June 8 on the bill presented by Podemos on senior centers, with which it is intended to “shield residences from new cuts and significantly improve staff ratios and care for our elders.” This was indicated by the purple formation in a statement in which the departure of 150 workers from the centers is described as the “umpteenth betrayal” of the Minister of Social Policy, Isabel Franco, “to the elderly, their families and the workers , that every day they see how their centers are in a more precarious situation». For the regional spokesperson for Podemos, María Marín, this shows that the regional government “has not learned anything from the pandemic.”
Marín recalled yesterday that, during the first wave of Covid and with the lethality triggered among the elderly, the regional government committed to a change of model to give our elders more dignified care. Some promises that, according to the Podemos spokesperson, “they did not intend to fulfill at any time, as evidenced by the fact that, at the first opportunity, they have sent a considerable part of the workforce out of work.” Cuts to which must be added, according to Marín, the delay for more than a year of the decree that modifies the minimum conditions that residences must meet.
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