The savings that users will have from not increasing the rates by 8.5% that corresponded to the CPI in 2023 will be passed on to them in future increases
The government decided in its last Council of Ministers of the year that the increase in motorway tolls should be 4% by 2023, less than half of the increase set by the regulation related to the evolution of the consumer price index (CPI) that the sector had recorded and should have been close to 8.5% this year. A historic increase that would have been practically unaffordable for the millions of users who record the eleven toll highways each year in a context of economic crisis and a decline in disposable income for families.
But what is not paid now will be paid later. The concessionaires of the 1,500-kilometer state toll network (the main ones being Abertis, Itínere, Glovalbía and Ausol), which cost about 1,500 million euros in 2019, are not prepared to lose half of what they would bill in 2023 if they meet the increase linked to the CPI. Negotiations between the government and these companies have been difficult in recent weeks and eventually the Ministry of Transport set a compensation for them, but far from what they had asked for.
In concrete terms, with a line of 23.3 million euros between 2023 and 2026, the State will subsidize part of the income that these concessionaires will no longer receive next year due to the containment of the toll increase. For example, they explain from Transport that the agreement establishes the obligation for the state to provide the necessary items to “partially mitigate” the increase between 2024 and 2026, so that it is staggered.
Naturally, from 2027, this fee will be paid directly by the users of the said highways. From then on, a series of fare increases above the CPI for that year are allowed, so that drivers will pass on this year’s savings in future fare increases, albeit gradually.
From the Ministry of Transport, they explain that the increase in fares will be “cumulative”, that is, the user will eventually pay the difference that he will not pay in 2023, but little by little so that the high toll increase that could have that took place on January 1 without an agreement between the concessionaires and the government will have a diluted impact over time and can be adopted “in better conditions by the citizens”, they emphasize.
The Government Gazette (BOE) states that from 2024 the percentage of the compensation that the Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management pays the concession holders will be gradually reduced. But this amount will be set before January 1 of each year on the proposal of the government and “by December 31, 2026 at the latest, this subsidy must be abolished”.
The decree also stipulates that from 2023, the concessionaires must send the government, in the first fifteen days of each quarter, a report on the transits that have taken place in the previous quarter, indicating the toll revenues that would have been received had they not been received, this limit of 4% would have been applied. With this information, the Ministry of Transport calculates the compensation for each company, adding the interest accrued from the 16th day of the second month to the date of payment, calculated at the legal interest rate of money, details of the BOE .
This will be the first time that the government has failed to implement the CPI toll revaluation since its adoption in 2002. The largest increase in recent years occurred in 2007, when rates increased by 4.5% according to 2006 average inflation. Far below the increases of recent years, with 1.97% in 2022, 0.11% in 2021, 0.84% in 2020 or 1.2% in 2019.
Source: La Verdad
I’m Ben Stock, a journalist and author at Today Times Live. I specialize in economic news and have been working in the news industry for over five years. My experience spans from local journalism to international business reporting. In my career I’ve had the opportunity to interview some of the world’s leading economists and financial experts, giving me an insight into global trends that is unique among journalists.
