Cuts to municipalities with Pnrr funds. Decaro (Anci): 'Absurd decision'.

'Absurd', 'paradoxical', 'unreasonable'. The revolt of the municipalities against the distribution method of the spending review cuts is on. 'The Mef's decision,' Anci president Antonio Decaro puts it in a note, 'contradicts the spirit and purposes of the NRP and puts the management of public works at risk.

Inflaming the tones, which resort to the whole armoury of the harshest adjectives, is the parameter for the allocation of cuts to individual local authorities written in the draft implementing decree prepared by the Ministry of the Economy and anticipated in Il Sole 24 Ore of 25 May. In practice, half of the cuts are measured in proportion to the NRP resources allocated to each administration at the end of 2023, so those who have more projects financed by the Plan suffer greater cuts. This year, the bill borne by municipalities, cities, and provinces is 250 million, but it is part of a cure that until 2028 is worth 1.25 billion: assuming it does not increase with the next manoeuvre.

The mechanism devised at the Mef also comes as a surprise to the Ministry for the Pnrr led by Raffaele Fitto, who in the past few hours received a fiery letter from the heads of Anci and Upi, together with Economy Minister Giancarlo Giorgetti and Viminale chief Matteo Piantedosi. The discussion, in short, promises to become lively even within the government.

The provision implements, in its own way, a provision of the manoeuvre (paragraph 533 of Law 213 of 2023) that calls for the cuts to be allocated 'taking into account' the NRP funds received by each entity. A formula that seemed, according to some interpretations, to prefigure a sort of safeguard of the Pnrr investments; and that instead turns out to be its opposite.