tabasa

On the 5th of December, the Catalan Executive allocated the tender to privatise the public companies Tabasa and Túnels del Cadí to the joint venture formed by Invicat (owned by Abertis) and the investment bank BTG Pactual. On Friday, the deal was completed and the Catalan Government earned €309.6 million, representing 72% of the total of the €430 million operation. In addition, the two public companies will effectively disappear. The concession will last for the next 25 years and the Catalan Government will continue to own the infrastructures but it will transfer the management and exploitation. The operation includes the tolls at the Vallvidrera highway tunnels accessing Barcelona and the Cadí tunnel, at Cerdanya County, in the Pyrenees.

The third plan represents an additional budget cut of €1.5 billion, in order to meet the 1.5% deficit target for this year. The President of the Catalan Government, Artur Mas, said that the plan “guarantees essential services”. He also stated that if the Spanish Government had paid what it owed last year, the current reduction would be halved. The plan decreases budget allocations for public companies, reduces public employee salaries once again, decreases the amount allocated for subsidies, delays investments, privatises some public companies, sells public buildings, and implements the measures decided by the Spanish Government regarding health and education. The opposition criticised the plan for not being concrete and effective enough.