Island Councils to have more power under new Statute

THE reforms to the Balearic Statute, expected to be approved before the next regional elections, will involve the “immediate” transfer of three new powers to the Island Councils. This will give a better regional government, allowing each institution to format “different” regulations according to its own needs, according to the deputy leader of the Balearic Government, Rosa Estaras. She was speaking at the opening of a speech at a congress on the changes which will be made to the Island Councils under the new Home Rule Statue.
Estaras said that the reform of the Statute says that the Island Councils “are institutions of the autonomous region which are governed by the law of 2000”, and establishes that to make any modification to this law requires the approval of two thirds of Parliament. From the time of the final approval of the reform, the Councils will also have, in additon to “their own powers” which they are already exercising (transport, youth, culture, social services etc.), three more, local administration, policies for the family and policies for sport. According to Estaras, after this there is another list of “delegated powers” whose transfer needs a more complicated process, via the approval of a law. She also referred to the “closing clause” which “guarantees the territorial balance amongst all the islands which are part of the autonomous region”.
Estaras mentioned the creation of the new Council of Formentera. Negotiations are still going on between the Balearic Government and the Council of Ibiza and Formentera to determine the financing of this new Council. Among these structural changes, Estaras highlighted the approval of a unique register for the Island Councils, which will allow citizens to differentiate between the Balearic Government, town councils and Island Councils, and which she hoped would be in place for the next elections in 2007. The reform of the Statute also establishes the creation of a new organisation, the Association of Presidents (which will have as its members the leader of the Balearic Government and the Presidents of the Island Councils), whose functions and actions will be determined later via the approval of a specific law, she added. According to Estaras, these days of discussion, which the Council of Majorca organised, are “very opportune”, as they serve to analyse the changes which the new Statute will bring which will be an “overturning of institutional organisation” in the Balearics, and which is the fruit of the “intense” work of the Commission of Experts, and the later parliamentary report, during the last two years.