The new garbage rate that the central government will force mayors to introduce starting in April next year so that each resident pays 100% of the cost of collecting, transporting and recycling organic waste is not the only option that the directive The European Union gives governments to pay for the generation of waste and from which the Spanish idea of creating a new municipal tax that must be collected separately, for example, from the IBI in which it is integrated in many cases, is based. This is clear from the response of the vice president of the European Commission Maroš Šefčovič to a question from the PP in Brussels about the “mandatory nature” of the new garbage tax, in which he refers to the “non-exhaustive list of examples of economic instruments” to which EU countries can resort to, to which other measures could be added that can also be determined by “local authorities”.
“Annex IVa of the directive contains a non-exhaustive list of examples of economic instruments and other measures to incentivize the implementation of the waste hierarchy that Member States may use at their discretion to cover the costs of waste management,” says Šefčovič. in his response to the PP. It adds that the “local authorities” of each country “may also adopt other measures that do not appear in the annex” which, in addition, “may vary depending on the agents on whom they are imposed, such as, for example, companies, producers or households.
From their response it is clear that creating a new mandatory and separate collection rate, for 100% of the cost of collecting, transporting and recycling waste, was not the only instrument that the Government had in its hands to comply with the principles of directive, make its producers pay for the generation of waste, under the principle that whoever pollutes, pays.
“The directive does not impose any garbage tax. The green radicalism of Teresa Ribera is clear, who wants to force citizens to pay in full for recycling and for this she will have to give explanations,” said Dolors Montserrat, spokesperson in the European Parliament for the PP, the party that is most clearly opposing the new “tazo” of garbage. Last week, he was left alone in Congress in defending a bill to urge the Government to “repeal the mandatory nature” of the rate and “respect municipal autonomy and recognize the freedom of city councils to establish their own taxes.” , allowing them to reduce the tax burden on their citizens with other resources, something that is not allowed in the case of the new tax
As recalled by the vice president of the European Commission, the directive proposed setting landfill and incineration rates, payment systems for waste generation according to the amount of waste generated, tax incentives for donating food, sustainable public procurement to encourage better waste management. waste or deposit and return systems such as the one that the Government will foreseeably be able to implement in two years for the collection of plastic bottles, cans and bricks.
The menu of alternatives proposed by the European directive confronts the justification that the Government has given regarding its obligation, at the request of the EU, to create a tax that was embodied in the law in April 2022, but that gave three years to the town councils to start collecting it. This period expires in April 2025 and is causing widespread rejection by mayors against a rate for which they denounce that they do not have clear criteria from the Ministry of Finance and, in some cases, that will increase the cost of living of their neighbors. .
In a meeting in Moncloa last week, the president of the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces (FEMP), María José María García-Pelayo, unsuccessfully asked the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, to withdraw the obligation to create the new tax rate. garbage and assured that they are already studying “legal measures” for when April arrives and the obligation to create and collect a new tax comes into force that the FEMP remembers is only a local competence.
This Tuesday, after learning of the response that Šefčovič has given to the PP, the president of the FEMP and mayor of Jerez de la Frontera has assured that the Government has been “unmasked by the European Commission” because the directive “does not require imposing a garbage rate so that municipalities can collect, transfer and treat waste.”