The Renovating Movement of Tinajo has expressed its “disappointment” and “outrage” with the budget that the government group approved in the Plenary held this Wednesday, corresponding to the already settled year of 2021. “Not only are they not capable of approving the accounts on time, but we also see how they continue to waste money, without taking into account the needs of the municipality”, denounces the councilor and spokesperson for the MRT, Antonio Morales.
In this regard, he emphasizes that these budgets reflect an increase of 936,000 euros compared to 2020, which, however, "has not resulted in improving the lives of the residents." “The mayor spent the whole year selling that things were difficult due to the pandemic, that they were going to receive less income, and now we discovered that they had almost a million euros more, and all they did was increase the waste”, Morales laments.
"Only the chapter destined for protocol attention has increased by 20,500 euros, going from 24,000 euros in 2020 to 44,500 in 2021, which practically means doubling it in the middle of a pandemic", he denounces. In addition, he adds that "the salaries of the mayor and the released councilors of the government group were increased by 14,000 euros; and hundreds of thousands of euros were allocated to external companies, without knowing what work they did, because the government group continues to breach the legal obligation to publish the contracts on the City Council's platform."
“The basic services demanded by the residents, such as lighting, sidewalks, roads and paving, are still in poor condition; and they did not allocate any item linked to the primary sector, nor to cultural activities, nor environmental issues, nor renewable energies, nor tourism issues. They have not contributed a penny to help the SMEs and self-employed in the municipality, nothing for employment plans, nothing to guide the young people of the municipality, nothing for training the unemployed... A disaster”, summarizes the spokesperson for the Renovating Movement, who voted against these budgets.
In addition, he questions that the government group "has not even been able to execute a plan that has been approved in Plenary since December 2019, and that was aimed at reactivating the municipality, to generate economy and employment."
The “leg pulling” with salaries
Regarding the increase in the item destined for the salaries of the councilors of the government group and their advisor, the mayor's explanation was that they have returned to recover the percentage that they reduced from their payrolls when the pandemic broke out. “They sold it with great fanfare in their day, but then they said nothing when they raised their salary again. They did that very quietly”, Morales reproaches, who considers that this announcement was “a leg pulling of the neighbors”.
In addition, he questions that "they have not even clarified now since when they stopped applying that reduction that they boasted so much about." “What is certain is that they did not comply with what they had promised”, affirms the councilor of the MRT. And it is that what they announced in March 2020 is that they would maintain a 10% reduction in the salaries of the mayor, the released councilors and the eventual staff “as long as the state of pandemic declared by the WHO lasts", something that has not even happened yet today.
“The most serious thing is that we are not even talking about the current situation. The increase included in the budgets was made in 2021, when the island was experiencing its worst moment”, Morales emphasizes, recalling that the first months of that year, Lanzarote was at level 4 of health alert, "with almost daily deaths from Covid and with very serious economic repercussions." “While people were having a bad time, what the government group did was pull the leg of the citizens”, insists the spokesperson for the MRT.
“Populism and demagoguery have no limit for some people and that is leading the municipality to a difficult return situation. Each time the basic services are worse, when the budgets are higher and the waste is also much higher”, he denounces.
The mayor “fails once again to keep his word” with the RPT
In the plenary session held this Wednesday, the government group also approved the Job Position List (RPT), "failing to keep the word that he had given to the opposition" according to the MRT. “He had told us that he was going to discuss this issue with all the groups and that he was going to agree on it”, recalls Antonio Morales.
However, he affirms that what they did was give them the documentation 48 hours before the Plenary. “That means that it is impossible to study it, because it includes many documents, reports, a study...”, laments the councilor, who reproaches the mayor for “failing once again to keep his word”.
In this case, the party chose to abstain due to the impossibility of analyzing a document that is vital for the City Council of Tinajo. “We abstained because it is impossible to vote for something that we do not know”, explains the councilor, who laments that “such an important issue for the Consistory” is approved in that way.
