The vice president of Facua, Miguel Ángel Serrano, is disappointed with the work of the Ministry of Consumption, which he accuses of ignoring certain issues that negatively affect consumers and users
The spanish inflation closed March in numbers not seen since the mid-1980s. With a rise in prices of 9.8% compared to the same month of 2021, the consumer begins to notice it in his pocket during his day to day. First it was electricity, then it was followed by gasoline and now food products. Measures such as the abolition of electricity taxes or the 20 cent discount on fuel try to curb the rise in the cost of basic products. Could the Executive dare with the shopping cart? So believes the vice president of the facua consumer associationMiguel Ángel Serrano, who in an interview with EL PERIÓDICO DE ESPAÑA asked the Ministry led by Alberto Garzon greater performance for the issues that are really important to users.
Q. Given this upward spiral, are Facua receiving more complaints or questions from consumers?
A. We are receiving more inquiries about price increases, but only for some specific sectors. Especially in matters of electricity, which raises their electricity bill a lot and they do not know if it is justified, or due to the modification of the contractual conditions, which raises their rates, which is very common in telephony. In a time of totally disproportionate inflation, in which the CPI is skyrocketing, obviously the consumer is suffering from it on a daily basis.
Q. Much of that inflation is due to the cost of electricity. Could the Government have done more to avoid the rise in the electricity bill?
R. For years we have been warning that we are in a maelstrom where the price of electricity rises dramatically. It is not a matter of the armed conflict in Ukraine as the Government has tried to make it appear, this goes back a long way. It has its origin in how the electricity market has been liberalized in Spain, where a small group of large companies determines the real price per kilowatt.
In addition, the marginal auction system leads to the absurdity that the price applied to all production is the price of the most expensive production. It is as if to go from Seville to Madrid, the price of the plane is the one that applies to transport by bus or train. This is what happens with the marginal auction: the most expensive price set by the last production chain, which is usually gas, sets in the end how much it is worth to produce everything. From Facua we have sent a lot of proposals to the Government to remove certain productions from this marginalist system, such as hydroelectric energy. That energy is paid for what it is worth.
Q. What are those proposals with which to prevent the electricity bill from increasing so much?
R. In these cases, what must be done is to limit the price of the megawatt, that the public authorities intervene. It seems that Spain and Portugal are going to manage to limit this cost, but it has not yet been applied and we do not know what impact it will have. We believe that the announced limit is totally insufficient, it is still much higher than what the electricity market has been paying years ago.
As for the social bonus, it is still a discount on the regulated rate and, if it does not stop rising, the bill that reaches the beneficiary of the aid continues to be very high. On top of that, this social bonus today has such difficult access characteristics that it makes it very difficult to access it and many consumers who have difficulty paying their electricity bill at the end of the month theoretically cannot be beneficiaries of the social bonus. Access criteria need to be made more flexible.
We have also proposed lowering certain tax rates, such as VAT. 21% seems disproportionate to us, electricity is not a luxury service, it is a basic service. It is true that the Government has carried out this VAT reduction, but it has only been done temporarily, it will not be continuous over time.
Q. Gasoline is another product that suffered a big rise last month. From April 1, the Government applies a discount of 20 cents per liter. What could the Executive do to continue lowering the cost of fuel?
R. The Government always tries to make an excuse that there are certain behaviors that it cannot carry out or certain market limitations that it cannot carry out because it is prohibited and that it mysteriously does so later. It happened with the electricity VAT, which they said they couldn’t control and finally it was controlled temporarily; It happened with the possible limitation of the electricity auction and now it seems that the EU has given the green light. They also said that they could not intervene in the price of fuel and have put this discount of 20 cents per liter.
You can really continue doing things, and more so in a final market that is still speculative. It is true that there is a direct relationship with the issue of the armed conflict in Ukraine and the EU’s sanctioning measures against Russia, but we have also been seeing for years how mysteriously the price of gasoline and diesel has extremely high peaks at certain times of the year. year, as the start of holiday operations. This is repeated year after year, it seems that it is evident that there is market speculation behind it.
P. The rise in electricity and gasoline has also caused an increase in the cost of the shopping basket. Can you control the price in supermarkets?
R. Of course, if inflation continues to rise as it is rising and continues to affect all products without equal, not only certain luxury products but also basic products, it is clear that there will come a time when the Government will have to intervene.
Just as it has intervened with the price of gasoline or to try to cushion the possible increases in housing rentals by limiting it to 2% instead of being updated according to the CPI, there is probably no other choice but to apply measures that limit it for the acquisition of certain basic products. If not, we will find ourselves in the position that there will be consumers in Spain who will have serious difficulties in acquiring basic products in the food sector. Obviously, we should not reach that situation in any case.
Q. After electricity and gasoline, is it possible that the next big increase in bills will be that of running water?
A. The issue of water is quite a complex issue. It is not possible to speak of a uniform behavior throughout the territory, but depending on the locality in which we find ourselves, the fixing of prices is one way and is more or less expensive, as well as the quality of the service itself.
It depends on factors both at the local level and at the regional level: there are municipalities that have the service through public entities and others do so through concessions with private entities, so these rates fluctuate depending on how it is managed, the infrastructure network, maintenance, other fees,…
Taking into account that the production of water is directly related to the electricity market, it could be that the price of drinking water rises
But taking into account that the production of water is directly related to the electricity market, because you need electricity to be able to get the water to the users’ homes, it could be that something as exceptional as drinking water rises in price, which It would mean another slab on the economy of consumers and users, who are already quite tight. It should be hoped that this does not happen, because the UN has decreed on several occasions that access to drinking water is a human right and that is how we defend it from Facua.
Q. For the first time, since 2020, the Ministry of Consumption is its own portfolio. Are you doing enough to defend consumers and users?
R. When a specific Ministry of Consumer Affairs was created, separate from Health, at Facua we consider it good news: consumption has enough weight in our current society for it to have its own ministry. The problem is that the work of the Ministry leaves a lot to be desired, it is focusing on aspects that are not essential in the current reality and it is ignoring certain issues that are affecting consumers and users in a very negative way.
The work of the Ministry leaves a lot to be desired, it is focusing on aspects that are not essential in the current reality
And an example of this is not the non-action, but the lack of response to many letters that we, as a consumer association, transferred to the Ministry. We see the last example with the gas stations: in the situation in which we find ourselves of runaway inflation, that a consumer association informs you of 230 possible gas stations that are carrying out a breach of the regulations and harming the consumer and that you don’t even deign to answer… leaves a lot to be desired.
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