Court of Auditors recommends extending term port concessions – publico

 
         

                 

                         
                     

                 

 
 

Contrary to what suggested the Competition Authority, the preliminary findings of the study made on the port sector, and which argued that concessions should come back as soon as possible to the competition and the market, the Court of accounts defends the possibility that the maximum length of a concession contract can be increased. This is one of the recommendations made in the audit of the port authorities report, which was released on Thursday.

The Court of Auditors recommends that the government “consider changing the legal framework Portugal, with regard to the duration of concessions, “and that in Portugal is limited to 30 years, in order to allow” in future contracts of public service concessions in this sector can be concluded with the reference periods in force in the legal systems the main international competitor countries. ” For example, in Spain, as the Court of Auditors, where in 2014 a legislative amendment allowed the possibility of extending the maximum period of port concessions, the then 35 to 50 or even 75 years.

in the contradictory that sent to the Court of Auditors, in the report, the Minister of the Sea referred to this same study of the Competition Authority, and claimed that “all the nuances of the possible options are shown non-consensual, so it appears the need for careful evaluation of the same. ” Ana Paula Vitorino said he was waiting for European directives that are currently under discussion to further evaluate the adjustments that will need to make the national framework “

The Court of Auditors argues that the extension of the terms of the contracts allows” the dealers a longer time horizon order to recoup the investments made in their infrastructure. “in Leixões, for example, both container terminals of dealerships requested the extension of their concessions in order to amortize investments deemed necessary. the government headed by Passos Coelho, continuing the guidelines of the troika, put all concession contracts renegotiated. Only the contract with PSA, which has the concession of Terminal XXI at Sines, was completed. the review process stopped with the change of government . the current minister said that by the end of the first half would take decisions in this matter.

the Court of Auditors also recommended the Government to unlock the legal obstacles to allow grantors port authorities undertake to strengthen of human resources required to enable us to improve the efficiency of management systems, monitoring and supervision of public service concession contracts.

the audit of the management, monitoring and supervision of public service concession contracts cargo handling within the port authorities, covered 21 contracts for the management of the Port of Aveiro, administration of the Douro ports, Leixões and Viana do Castelo, administration of the Port of Lisbon, administration of Sines Port and the Algarve and administration of Setúbal and Sesimbra ports. Lusa