Pnrr, here are delays and obvious problems
A lot of Pnrr money hasn't been spent yet: that's why. The speech by Alessandra Servidori, professor of labor policies
We have been and are still paying close attention to the budget law, but we must understand how much the Pnrr affects the current economic situation if it is true, as it is true, that – data in hand – the Economic and Financial Update Note already told us that some approximately 191.5 billion euros that the EU has assigned to our country, only about 21 will be spent by the end of the current year, i.e. in 25 days.
Considering the entire path of the Pnrr up to now (therefore also with the data relating to 2021), the total expenditure should have amounted to approximately 33.7 billion euros. With specific reference to 2022 however, the Economics and Finance document envisaged a total expenditure of around 29.4 billion euros, 14.4 more than those reported in the Nadef of 15 billion.
The delays are evident: a lot of money has not yet been spent because many construction sites have not been started, raw materials spmp have increased a lot and public works are blocked; many announcements from local authorities have gone deserted, such as those concerning nursery schools, and therefore still often repeated without success, especially in the south.
To make up for lost time, our country will therefore have to spend much more money in the coming years. But either the procedures are simplified, or the problems will recur. However, tenders and projects are complicated to monitor, and we think that as many as 3,800 recruitments were envisaged to support the administrations with the recruitment of 1,000 experts, which however were very few. Even today it is difficult to support requests, given the fact that the type of contract offered was fixed-term.
Let's consider that the government has allocated 12 billion in order not to block the Pnrr projects, both to deal with the increase in the cost of raw materials and energy, and increased the allocation of 6 funds to support the administrations involved in the implementation of the projects Pnrr up to 2026. And the most substantial intervention is that linked to the fund for the start-up of works that cannot be postponed, which amounts to a total of 8.8 billion and the project data uploaded to the Regis platform for a total value of around 65 billion, are included in the second report for the parliament on the implementation of the Pnrr. It is difficult to verify them because the platform data are not and will not be fully accessible, but it will depend on the speed with which the various implementing bodies send the requested information.
The truth is that to make up for lost time, our country will therefore have to spend much more money in the coming years. Specifically: 40.9 billion in 2023, 46.5 billion in 2024, 47.7 billion in 2025 and 35.6 billion in 2026. But we need, and immediately, a concrete alliance between the public and private sectors, above all to SMEs, in terms of support and advice.
This is how the banking system has moved through tenders and a range of concrete solutions on the financial level for innovative projects and specialized planning. The Anac, the anti-corruption authority, has excluded the funds of the Pnrr from the 49% limit if they do not affect national public finance and the non-repayable loans of the EU in public-private partnership contracts are not borne by the PA. A nice help.
We also know that the so-called timetable of the Plan has obvious uncertainties on the competition rule and the simplification of the procurement code: with the decrees already approved with stop and go in the territories, as shown for example by the delays of some regions, especially the southern ones, in redefining the governance of the water service. For others still in the pipeline, however, there are political decisions that are not easy for the majority to take, such as the reform of local public services, which obtained an agreement in the joint conference subject to the opening of discussion tables on direct assignments, local transport and territorial areas, but above all it still has to pass the parliamentary test and that of the final go-ahead in the council of ministers. And the mapping of concessions is at the same point, while the decree is still on seaside resorts.
And we know well that the obstacles of prices and raw materials and the uncertainty of the 110% bonus already reduced by the budget law are one thing, and those due to uncertain governance or complicated political decisions are another.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/economia/pnrr-ritardi-problemi/ on Tue, 06 Dec 2022 09:17:52 +0000.