Just five days after the Government announced its energy saving plan approved in the last Council of Ministers, the Minister for Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, has been forced to summon the autonomous communities to an emergency meeting next Tuesday to clarify doubts and end all the controversies about the planwhose first measures will enter into force next Wednesday.
It will not be a political call for presidents and top leaders of the different ministries, but “a technical meeting” led by the Institute for Energy Diversification and Saving (IDAE), the body that has coordinated the drafting of these measures. In this Consultative Commission of General Directors, which will be chaired by the Director General of the IDAE, Joan Groizard, they will seek to resolve “all doubts about the application of the royal decree law” -stated government sources-, especially those related to occupational safety and health, that is, those that have to do with the controversial temperature cap and put an end to “all misunderstandings”.
After the publication of the new regulations in the BOE last Tuesday, a cascade of criticism and doubts have arisen due to the inaccuracies in the published text, which it did not specify such important aspects as the application exceptions or the sanctioning modelwhich is why some communities, the majority governed by the PP, but also others, have expressed doubts about the application of the plan, such as the temperature of the hotel spaces or the lighting of the monuments, among other issues.
In an interview on Onda Cero, the minister charged against the attacks suffered by the decree law, which she recalled “it is to be applied” because the measures it contains are “affordable” for everyone. Ribera lamented that in a context as difficult as the current one, the debate does not focus on “how can we help” but on “how to avoid complying or how to avoid sanctions”, because “it seems that there is an invitation not to comply”.
The minister was referring to the pulse that the PSOE and the PP maintain these days on these measures, since the president of the Community of Madrid, Isabel Ayuso, announced her opposition to complying with them. “It is important to contribute when others need it”, insisted Ribera in reference to France, which has supply problems and receives gas from countries such as Spain, both direct gas and that used to produce electricity. These exports, he has clarified, do not count in the 7% that Spain must reduce in its consumption, an objective that is “affordable” without prejudice to the industry.