Law 15/2014 of 16 September on Rationalization of the Public Sector and Other Measures of Administrative Reform

OFFICIAL STATE GAZETTE No. 226 Wednesday, September 17, 2014 Sec. I. Page 72336 I. GENERAL PROVISIONS HEAD OF STATE 9467 Law 15/2014, of September 16, on Rationalization of the Public Sector and Other Measures of Administrative Reform.

FELIPE VI KING OF SPAIN

To all who see and understand this. Know: That the General Courts have approved and I come to sanction the following law:

PREAMBLE I The economic crisis has highlighted a premise that must be sustained beyond economic circumstances, namely that the public sector must be sustainable over time and that efficiency in the management of its resources must be guaranteed.

According to economic theory, there is no optimal size for the public sector, but there are indicators that give an idea of its dimension. The most common is the ratio of Public Spending to Gross Domestic Product (GDP). According to this indicator, Spain is among the ten countries in the European Union with the lowest public spending as a percentage of GDP, which amounted to 43.4% in 2012 (excluding financial aid).

From the point of view of revenues as a percentage of GDP, Spain has traditionally also been below the average of the euro area.

However, as a result of the economic crisis and the action of automatic stabilizers, in recent years there has been a strong increase in public spending and a significant reduction in revenue, which has resulted in a long period of public deficits that are not sustainable in the medium and long term, making it necessary to advance in the process of fiscal consolidation.

In this context, addressing a profound reform of the Public Administrations is an unavoidable issue. It must be ensured that public services are provided in the most efficient way and at the lowest possible cost: that all economies of scale are exploited, that there are no overlaps or duplications, and that procedures are simple and standardized.

The rationalization of the structure of the Public Administration, as part of the Government's reform program, has a precedent of great significance in the Organic Law on Budgetary Stability and Financial Sustainability, which constitutes a milestone in the management of public resources, by establishing specific spending and debt objectives for all Administrations, as well as the obligation to present plans aimed at their compliance and the corresponding mechanisms to ensure their achievement.

Despite this, the objective of a reform of the Public Administrations cannot be other than to turn the Spanish Administration into a factor of efficiency and productivity, which enables economic growth and the effective provision of public services.

To this end, on October 26, 2012, the Council of Ministers agreed to the creation of a Commission for the Reform of the Public Administrations (CORA), which was to prepare a report with proposals for measures that would provide the Administration with the size, efficiency, and flexibility demanded by citizens and the country's economy.

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OFFICIAL STATE GAZETTE No. 226 Wednesday, September 17, 2014 Sec. I. Page 72337 On June 21, 2013, the Council of Ministers received from the Vice President and Minister of the Presidency, and the Minister of Finance and Public Administrations, the aforementioned report, and by Royal Decree 479/2013, of the same date, the Office for the Execution of the Administration Reform was created, as the body responsible for the coordinated execution, monitoring, and promotion of the measures included therein, and may propose new measures.

Since the publication of the Report of the Commission for the Reform of the Public Administrations, and even prior to that, various norms and agreements have been issued for the formal execution of the proposals contained therein.

Thus, for example, the necessary agreements have been taken for the implementation of the Project Emprende in 3; the services provided by the State Motor Vehicle Fleet and the Units of the Motor Vehicle Fleet integrated into the Delegations and Subdelegations of the Government and Island Directorates have been regulated; the transfer of the Center for Economic and Commercial Studies to the Institute of Fiscal Studies has been completed; or the telematic service has been launched on the electronic headquarters of the Social Security for the sending of certificates of being up to date with contributions. The National Strategy for the eradication of violence against women has also been approved, as a coordinating instrument for the action of the Public Administrations in this matter, or the Regulation of Law 29/2011, of September 22, on Comprehensive Recognition and Protection of Victims of Terrorism, which will allow victims private and electronic access to the status of processing of their procedures. Likewise, the Council of Ministers approved, in its meeting of August 2, 2013, the Annual Plan of Employment Policy 2013.

Law 14/2013, of September 27, on support for entrepreneurs and their internationalization, revises the threshold of 300 square meters so that commercial establishments can replace the opening license with a responsible declaration, regulates the creation of the Successive Formation Limited Company, and includes measures to favor the access of small and medium-sized enterprises to public contracting. Another example of a CORA measure that has been finally approved is Law 21/2013, of December 9, on environmental assessment.

On the other hand, various draft laws submitted or already approved by the General Courts contain measures coming from the Report.

With regard to the reorganization of the institutional public sector, progress has also been made in its restructuring process.

The extinction of the Solar Decathlon Consortium has been carried out. Additionally, the dissolution of the Loading and Unloading Companies of the Port of La Gomera and the Port of La Estaca del Hierro has been agreed upon, and they are in the liquidation phase.

To advance in the reorganization of the public entities analyzed in the Report, parallel to the present Law, Royal Decree 701/2013, of September 20, on rationalization of the public sector, has been approved, in which certain regulatory provisions are collected, and an Agreement by which measures of restructuring and rationalization of the foundational and corporate public sector are adopted, published through Order HAP/1816/2013, of October 2.

The present text adopts the necessary legislative measures to implement recommendations of the CORA, both for the reorganization of the institutional public sector, and in other areas of administrative activity.

II First of all, normative modifications are adopted to allow the reorganization of public bodies in order to improve their efficiency and reduce public spending.

In the Ministry of Defense, the Military Construction Service (SMC) is integrated, in the first place, into the Institute of Housing, Infrastructure and Equipment of Defense (INVIED). Likewise, the Autonomous Body Hydrodynamic Experience Canal of El Pardo, the Technological Institute "La Marañosa" and the Laboratory of Army Engineers "General Marvá" are integrated into the National Aerospace Technical Institute "Esteban Terradas".

The Law of June 3, 1940 created the Pious Work of the Holy Places of Jerusalem as an autonomous institution of the State, attached to the then newly created Ministry of Foreign Affairs, understanding that Spain could not abdicate its historical past and influence in the Middle East in the political, commercial, cultural and religious orders. More than seventy years have passed since then, with a new constitutional order in force, a new framework of relations with the Catholic Church, and a set of subsequent provisions governing entities of the state public sector, it is inexcusable to undertake the modification of its creation law with a triple purpose. First, to update and clearly enumerate its objectives and the competences attributed to it for its adequate compliance; second, to define, in accordance with the current legal system, its nature and establish its patrimonial, contractual, budgetary, accounting, tax and control regime. And, third, to provide that the entity be endowed with a new statute that establishes an organization and criteria of operation consistent with the general ones of the organization and modes of action of the entities of the Spanish Public Administration of our days.

In the educational field, the Autonomous Body European Educational Programs (OAPEE), which had been managing European Union programs of undeniable incidence in the field of higher education, is attributed the competence to promote the internationalization of the university system, a task that had been carried out by the Foundation for the International Projection of Spanish Universities (Universidad.es), a foundation that is extinguished. With this operation, complementary functions are concentrated in a single organism, which will allow greater effectiveness and efficiency in management.

In the cultural field, and with the aim of improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the State's cultural institutions, the Law provides in its article 6 for the signing of collaboration agreements between the National Institute of Performing Arts and Music, an autonomous body attached to the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport, and the RTVE Corporation, in order to promote and disseminate music at the national and international level.

These collaboration agreements may also contemplate the joint use of the resources of the RTVE Choir and the Choirs dependent on the National Institute of Performing Arts and Music, thus increasing their artistic capacity without having to resort to occasional external hiring.

The Law also fixes in the aforementioned article the minimum content of the collaboration agreements, in which the exercise of artistic direction in the actions subject to collaboration, as well as the economic terms thereof, must be regulated.

In any case, these agreements must respect the independence of the choral groups, not altering the legal relationship between the personnel participating in the joint performances and the public entities to which they depend.

Likewise, in the educational field, all functions of evaluation and accreditation of university teaching staff are concentrated in a single organism, which until now had been developed by the Agency National Quality Evaluation and Accreditation (ANECA) foundation and the National Commission for the Evaluation of Research Activity (CNEAI).

In accordance with what is described in the CORA Report, the State is responsible for the evaluation of the entire educational system, both in its programming and in its organization, through the National Institute of Educational Evaluation. However, in its territorial scope, the Autonomous Communities have created their own Evaluation Institutes that organize tests around "Evaluation Units" through questionnaires on linguistic and mathematical competence. In the Organic Law 8/2013, of December 9, on the Improvement of Educational Quality (LOMCE), a transformation of said system is foreseen in order to achieve interconnectivity between state and autonomous educational evaluations, which should lead to rescaling the Evaluation Units of the latter.

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OFFICIAL STATE GAZETTE No. 226 Wednesday, September 17, 2014 Sec. I. Page 72339 In the field of the evaluation of Study Plans leading to the obtaining of Official University Titles, the State has been attributed the regulation of the conditions for obtaining, issuing and homologation of academic and professional titles, which it carries out through ANECA.

Parallel to this, some Autonomous Communities have internationally homologated evaluation agencies and, therefore, with the capacity to evaluate the study plans of Universities (title evaluation); while others have evaluation agencies with competence only to issue reports regarding the renewal of accreditations already granted. Therefore, it is a matter of two administrations exercising the same function on the same territory.

All these changes suggest the conversion of the former ANECA Foundation into a public organism, which is carried out through the text of the present Law.

The public sector restructuring process must also have a special impact on organizations related to the internationalization of the Spanish economy. The Agreement of the Council of Ministers of March 16, 2012, approving the plan for the restructuring and rationalization of the state public sector, already authorized the global transfer of assets and liabilities of the "State Society for the promotion and attraction of foreign investments S.A." in favor of the public business entity ICEX Spain Export and Investments (ICEX). In this line, the integration of the own means activity branch currently carried out by the State Society Spain Expansion Abroad, S.A., related to the activity developed by ICEX, into the latter, is now established, with the aim of accentuating its support for internationalization, with the consequent cost savings and improvements in management derived from the synergies produced by the integration process.

On the other hand, the "Family Assistance Work of the Province of Seville" organism is suppressed, created in 1938 to meet the housing needs of disadvantaged families in the city of Seville, whose functions and legal regime no longer respond to the approach that determined its establishment. The necessary precautions have been taken so that the declaration of putting its assets into liquidation does not diminish the situation of the current occupants of the housing owned by the Organism, whose legal position is assured through the recognition of a lifelong usufruct right over them and of rights of preferential acquisition and direct access to purchase in the alienation processes.

III Another of the objectives sought in the reform of the Public Administration is the rationalization of public structures, especially in those areas where there are shared competences between different Administrations, so that each Administration has the size and means adequate for the exercise of the functions entrusted to it. The present text collects a series of legislative modifications to adapt the structures of the Ministries of Education, Culture and Sport; Employment and Social Security; and Health, Social Services and Equality; so that their functions, and especially those of observation, analysis, evaluation, and promotion of cooperation and coordination between the State and the Autonomous Communities, are carried out in a smaller number of entities and collegiate bodies, with a more global and integrative vision and at a lower cost to citizens.

Thus, in execution of the recommendations of the CORA, the General Budgetary Law 47/2003, of November 26, is modified, with a double purpose: first, to allow more effective control of the current accounts in which Treasury funds are located, covering not only the control for the opening of accounts in entities other than the Bank of Spain, but also those that are to be opened in this entity. In addition, the opening of accounts at the Official Credit Institute is regulated, establishing as a mandatory procedure the prior report of the General Secretariat of Treasury and Financial Policy on the regulatory agreement of the conditions for the use of said accounts.

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OFFICIAL STATE GAZETTE No. 226 Wednesday, September 17, 2014 Sec. I. Page 72340 Secondly, the aforementioned Law is modified to allow the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, jointly with the Ministry of Finance and Public Administrations, to sign contracts with one or more banking entities, different from the Bank of Spain, so that subsequently the administrative bodies authorized to open a current account can join the system through the adherence of those. Currently, a total of 3,163 accounts belonging to bodies of the General State Administration, Autonomous Bodies and State Agencies located outside the Bank of Spain have been identified. The modification made aims for the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, jointly with the Ministry of Finance and Public Administrations, to determine the conditions of use of the accounts in a centralized manner, corresponding to each of the administrative bodies that are authorized only the opening and use of the accounts. This centralized contracting will allow agreeing on homogeneous conditions applicable to all accounts, carry out better control of funds, avoid their dispersion and obtain more advantageous economic conditions.

Also within the framework of CORA measures, this Law introduces a legal regime, of a basic, simple and ex novo nature, regarding the right of separation of the members of the administrative consortium, and when this leads to its dissolution, the rules by which it will be governed are established. Subsequently, in the future Law on the Legal Regime of Public Administrations, an integral (creation, attachment, functioning, dissolution) and basic regime regarding consortia would be included, which would repeal this regulation and what is provided in Law 27/2013, of December 27, on rationalization and sustainability of the Local Administration. However, having these norms already will allow any Public Administration to exercise its right of separation from the consortium when it considers it to be the most appropriate solution for the sustainability of public accounts and when the legal requirements for it are met. With this new regime, the sustainability and efficiency of consortia and the legal certainty of their members are improved.

The norm also includes a specific modification of Law 56/2003, of December 16, on Employment, so that it is the Observatory of Occupations of the State Employment Service who analyzes the situation and trends of the labor market and the situation of training for employment in the entire State. This modification aims to contribute to avoiding the inefficient overlap of observatories of different Public Administrations in the field of employment and to improve its usefulness for the definition of public policies.

In the field of the Ministry of Health, Social Services and Equality, the Institute of Women was created by Law 16/1983, of October 24, in fulfillment and development of the constitutional principle of equality, as an autonomous body responsible for promoting and fostering equality between the sexes, facilitating the conditions for the effective participation of women in political, cultural, economic and social life. Currently, the aforementioned institute is attached to the Ministry of Health, Social Services and Equality, through the General Directorate for Equal Opportunities, coinciding in the tenure of both directorates general in the same person.

On the other hand, the General Directorate for Equal Opportunities, as established by Royal Decree 200/2012, of January 23, which develops the basic organizational structure of the Ministry of Health, Social Services and Equality and modifies Royal Decree 1887/2011, of December 30, which establishes the basic organizational structure of ministerial departments, is a management body of the State Secretariat for Social Services and Equality, whose functions are to promote active policies for employment and self-employment of women and to promote and develop the transversal application of the principle of equal treatment and non-discrimination.

With the aim of rationalizing the organization of the Administration and avoiding duplicities between administrative bodies, the integration of the competences of the General Directorate for Equal Opportunities within the tasks and structure of the Institute of Women is agreed.

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OFFICIAL STATE GAZETTE No. 226 Wednesday, September 17, 2014 Sec. I. Page 72341 The CORA Report also collects the suppression of various collegiate bodies, including the Governing Council of the Institute of Women, which, after the approval of Organic Law 3/2007, of March 22, for effective equality between women and men and its organizational development provisions, ceases to make sense as a ministerial coordination body in equality policies, once the Interministerial Commission for Equality between Women and Men was created.

Both issues are addressed by this norm, which modifies the denomination of the organism and its competences.

Likewise, article 33 of Law 62/2003, of December 30, on fiscal, administrative and social order measures, is modified, by which the Council for the promotion of equal treatment and non-discrimination of persons on the grounds of racial or ethnic origin is created, as a consequence of the transposition into the Spanish legal system of Article 13 of Council Directive 2000/43/EC, of June 29, 2000, on the application of the principle of equal treatment of persons irrespective of racial or ethnic origin. This modification has as its fundamental objective to adapt the aforementioned Council to the reality of the new administrative organization, to proceed to simplify its denomination to foster better and easier access to its services by the general citizenry, and by potential victims of discrimination in particular, clarifying its areas of action and expressly collecting the independence in the exercise of its functions, an indispensable requirement in the action of equality bodies provided for in the aforementioned article 13.

Also, in the field of the Ministry of Health, Social Services and Equality, through the present Law, the Interministerial Commission for the study of matters with budgetary significance for the financial equilibrium of the National Health System or significant economic implications is suppressed, whose creation was ordered by the Final Provision second of Law 16/2003, of May 28, on cohesion and quality of the National Health System, since its functions are concurrent with those held by the Ministry of Finance and Public Administrations, the Fiscal and Financial Policy Council of the Autonomous Communities, the Interministerial Commission for Medication Prices and the Government Delegated Commission for Economic Affairs.

On its part, function integration is carried out...