The Council of Ministers agreed this Tuesday to raise the spending ceiling to increase discounts for heavy vehicles on the AP-66 highway, between Asturies and León, to 60 percent.
This measure represents the previous step for the processing and approval of the Royal Decree that will allow increasing the reductions in highway tolls for heavy vehicles, which is currently at 40 percent, the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility has reported.
All heavy vehicles will be entitled to this new bonus, regardless of the payment system and the sections they travel.
This increase in bonuses for heavy vehicles is added to the one approved on October 15 for light vehicles, where the aid has been expanded from their first trip, with discounts of 15% on the first trip and 30% on the second. to regular users.
This improvement in bonuses for light vehicles that use the AP-66 on a recurring basis will come into effect next Friday, November 1.
The Ministry of Transport has explained that, with these improvements, it seeks to “continue encouraging” the use of this high-capacity road compared to its only alternative, the N-630 highway, with one lane in each direction as it passes through the Port. of Pajares.
Since the entry into force of the 40% bonus on the toll amount for all heavy vehicles and until September 30, 2024, 1,140,345 transits of this type of vehicle have been subsidized, which has generated “savings of about 13.6 million”
No suppression
In April of this year the European Commission ruled that the toll was extended illegally. The statement came after a complaint from Daniel Ripaformer secretary of We can Asturias.
The Minister of Development, Alejando Calvo, has trusted that the new 60 percent bonuses for heavy vehicles at the Huerna toll (AP-66), between Asturies and León, will materialize “as soon as possible” while the objective of working for its suppression.
Calvo has thus responded in the plenary session of the General Meeting to an interpellation and a question posed by the deputy of the mixed group Covadonga Tomé and the Vox parliamentarian Gonzalo Centeno.
The counselor has indicated that the Government is expected to announce today that transporters will see their bonuses increased from 40 to 60 percent, a discount that he described as a “very important achievement.”
“It is something very necessary, to continue moving forward on reality, increasing the bonuses with the aim of eliminating the toll,” he noted after remembering that its extension until 2050 was a “unilateral” decision by a PP Government that “penalized” the Principality. “to encourage investments in other communities” and that it is “easier to make it than to later reverse it.”
Faced with this, he pointed out, successive socialist executives have worked on implementing discounts, such as those that will benefit light vehicles from November 1.
Calvo explained that the information available to the Asturian Government about the infringement file against Spain for the extension of the toll concession is “partial”, but it does point to a “clear similarity” to what happened in 2019 with the extension of its Livorno-Civitavecchia highway, in Italy, which shows that the process is “long.”
The counselor has insisted that the objective of achieving its suppression is “possible”, although he has admitted that it is not an issue that can be achieved “immediately”.
For his part, Tomé has stressed the need to achieve the total elimination of this toll while transporters achieve discounts that do not solve their “precarious” situation, motivated by the price of fuel and the maintenance costs of their vehicles.
In her speech, the deputy criticized that the extension of the extension was a “personal success” of the then Minister of Public Works, Francisco Álvarez Cascos, founder of Foro Asturias, a party that changed its position on this toll and “even asked for explanations.” ” after his departure from the party, but, in an “opportunistic” manner, he tried to endorse the claim to declare the extension illegal.
For his part, Centeno has assured that the bonuses applied “are nothing more than giving birth to a scrawny mouse” and “alms” for the Asturians.
“Asturias is the Spanish peninsular region where the most expensive fuel is sold, the second region in the entire country with the highest tax pressure and the one with the second highest toll in the entire country. “We want justice and equal treatment with other territories,” he denounced.
The president of the Asturian Federation of Entrepreneurs (FADE), María Calvo, has valued the bonus, but has stated that the Principality’s businessmen aspire to the “complete elimination” of the rate.
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