Local Administration and Municipal Governance in Spain
LESSON 10: Local Administration and Municipal Governance in Spain
I. LOCAL ADMINISTRATION.
1. Constitutional Budgets. The study of local government must be based on constitutional regulation. This idea was obscured during the previous regime and the dictatorship of the 1920s, which had nonetheless laid the legislative foundations of Spanish local management in all matters not related to the approaches of political representation and empowerment of local corporations.
The constitutional regulation of local entities is specified in ensuring their autonomy. This constitutionally guaranteed autonomy implies an institutional guarantee that involves:
- The need for all state territory to be organized into municipalities, provinces, and islands in the archipelago.
- Recognition of a sphere of self-interest and the allocation of responsibility for its management. Although such powers are not established in the Constitution and are left to the ordinary legislator, they cannot be reduced to limits within which it is not possible to satisfy the interests that the Constitution gives local entities.
- It involves self-selection of governing bodies and their ability to represent and govern the interests of the community that make up these entities.
- It assumes local authorities are attributed to the power of ordinance, which is the ability to make rules of regulatory status.
- It recognizes local government financial sufficiency, which does not involve financial empowerment of local entities, although sufficient means may only come from means provided by other public entities.
The Constitution sanctions the State’s legislative competence to pass the foundations of the local system and regulates some aspects that must respect the ordinary legislator. On organizational regulation, it has some precision only in relation to the municipality and is open to solutions that can establish the ordinary legislator in relation to the province. Finally, the Constitution protects and respects the historical rights of the foral territories whose update should be carried out within the framework of the Constitution and the Statute of Autonomy.
2. The Law on Local Authorities.
A) Legislative Powers. The Spanish Constitution gives the State the power to approve the basic legislation on the local system, which is derived from the provisions of Article 149.1.18, which gives the State the power to approve the basic legislation on the Legal Status of all public administrations.
B) Basic State Legislation and Regional Development. Legislation is made up of the basic State Law Regulating the Basis of Local Government (LRBRL) of April 2, 1985; certain provisions of the Revised Text of the existing provisions of Rules local, approved by Royal Legislative Decree 781/1986 of April 18, which regulates and harmonizes the legislation on local arrangements; and the Local Finance Law of December 29, 1988.
However, state legislation on the local system does not end with the basic regulations because according to Article 149.3 of the Constitution, if any Autonomous Community had not assumed jurisdiction in this matter, the state should regulate the same in full. Moreover, the law of the autonomous state is residual and therefore applies when the autonomous communities do not legislate on the subject.
Besides the rules listed above, state law is integrated by the regulations implementing those laws on population and land demarcation, organization, operation, and the Legal System of Corporations, officials of national entitlement, and property. LRBRL also authorized the Government to update and accommodate, in addition to those mentioned, the Regulation of Services, which has not been approved.
The corresponding development of autonomous legislation is under its statutes to the Autonomous Communities, both those who passed by way of art. 151 EC and Navarra, and the others who took this competition in the reform of its statutes.
- Law of the Local.
One manifestation of the autonomy of local entities is their regulatory power, whose nature is purely statutory. The types of standards are the ordinances, which regulate matters bearing on the legal sphere of the governed, and the Regulations governing the organization and operation of such institution that approves and services.
D) Rules for Determining the Applicable Law in the Matter of the Local Government System. Article 5 of LRBRL established a set of rules on applicable law, reproducing what is already apparent from the Spanish Constitution, the statutes, and the Law itself, on the distribution of powers between the State and the Autonomous Communities and the rules of their own local entities. This article made an error since it prefixed organic regulations of local entities law LRBRL development of the Autonomous Communities. Annulled by the Constitutional Court means that the rules determining the legislation applicable in the various subjects of the general scheme are local, which is why our Constitution articulates the relationship between the state systems, regional and local levels. Regarding the State under article 149.1.18, local rules have attributed the Basic Law, which applies first, then the Development of the Autonomous Community concerned, if such jurisdiction is conferred by a statute and, finally, the regulations of the local entity itself. But the problem is knowing what the local system is as a commodity. Some materials countable in the local system are assigned by the Spanish Constitution of competence certificates to the State as with public property or general financial state and the State Debt. Furthermore, Article 2 states that LRBRL in the regulation of specific sectoral services and materials applicable law will be the first state or the Autonomous Communities. The same article also requires the requirement that special laws ensure adequate participation of local entities in the various subjects and services, determining which skills are specific to those entities.
II. THE MUNICIPALITY.
1. Historical Excursus. The Problem of Municipal Reform.
The municipality is the primary local government. It is a public entity consolidated as autonomous management of the interests of its neighbors in the Middle Ages, in the towns to which they are granted a special legal regime: The Jurisdiction. From the sixteenth century, the municipal organization is interfered with by the Magistrate, the actual appointment. It also creates local alderman appointments and allows the sale of public offices. Carlos III tried to regenerate the city government by creating common deputies and trustees ombudsmen.
The French Revolution would impose a uniform type of organization that spread to all populations. The Cortes of Cadiz in 1811 abolished the jurisdictional domains and deleted the posts of magistrates, aldermen, and mayors of royal appointment, and the Constitution of 1812 extended the municipalities to all Spanish towns. The Constitution only imposed the introduction of the municipalities to cities and towns that had a thousand souls, but the decree of May 23, 1812, broadened and regulated municipalities to populations with a lower number of neighbors.
The result of this historical process was that in Spain the number of municipalities is now very large. It is now widely defended a fundamental reform of municipal administration, removing all those municipalities whose feasibility in terms of administrative efficiency is questionable because of the poor social dimension. But this deletion and integration in other neighboring municipalities is a reform difficult to achieve because of opposition from the affected populations. Other lines of reform are aimed at the regionalization of small towns, but Article 42 of this policy LRBRL is unfeasible.
The Spanish Constitution, in Article 148, confers jurisdiction for municipal reform to the regional governments, but neither they decide to do it.
2. The Municipal Territory and Population.
The organization, the territory, and the population are the three elements of the Municipality.
A. The Territory.
The territory or municipality is the physical space on which the municipality exercises its powers, may not be continuous but in any case, be understood in the same province.
The most important assumptions of the alternation of municipalities are the aggregation of a municipality to an adjoining, merger by canceling two or more municipalities to join a new one that integrates and segregation of the territory of one or more municipalities to form a new one, without the prior extinct. This alteration, as the responsibility of the autonomous regions, is governed by the autonomous legislation, although Article 13 of LRBRL contains some basic provisions on the subject. The regulation of Article 13 is as an administrative decision that rests with the Autonomous Communities, which is an administrative procedure that requires the hearing of the municipalities involved and the mandatory opinion of the State Council, or upper body of the Community Advisory. The creation of new municipalities requires the existence of a territorially differentiated population center that is adequately resourced and that there would be a reduction of services which was being paid by the former municipalities of which is secreted. The State reserves action to promote the merger of small municipalities, the benefit of improving their management capacity.
Municipalities must appear in the Register of Local Authorities of the Ministry of Public Administration, which must communicate all changes in municipal boundaries.
B. Population.
It is constituted by residents in the municipality comprising the community that forms the basis of the municipal corporation.
It’s all Spanish neighbors of age habitually resident in the municipality and is registered in the Register. Registration is a legal duty and may be performed automatically by the municipality if the resident has more than two years dwelling in the municipality. The Act provides a list of rights and duties of neighbors and the right to vote and stand for foreigners who have the status of European Union citizens.
Article 18 of the LRBRL states that these are the rights and responsibilities of neighbors: a) vote and stand, b) participate in municipal management according to the provisions of laws and when required by the Corporation on a voluntary basis, c) use municipal services and access to communal land use, d) contribute through economic and personal benefits provided to legally conduct of municipal powers; e) be informed and make requests in relation to municipal records and documentation; f) request a referendum as provided by law g) require the establishment and provision of municipal utilities mandatory; h) such other rights and duties established by law.
Everyone living in Spain should be entered on the Register of the municipality in which they habitually reside, and if you do several, they live longer than a year. Students enrolled in the Register constitute the population of the municipality, this census is updated continuously and he developed a population census of all other public administrations and also the electoral rolls. Similarly, foreigners legally residing in Spain must register with the municipal census, but their rights will be established by law on aliens.
3. The Municipal Organization.
It has two variants:
A) The City.
The City Council has two essential organs: Parliament and the Mayor, together with the Deputy Mayor, exist in all municipalities. (Article 140 of the Spanish Constitution). A third body is the Committee on Government provided only in some municipalities.
a. The Plenum, which consists of all Councilmembers, elected by universal, equal, free, direct, and secret ballot by the residents. In local elections, the vote is also granted to EU citizens resident in the municipality. The electoral district is the township and the proportional election system of the highest ratios (D’Hondt method), based on closed and blocked lists submitted by political parties or groups of voters, demanding that the various candidates obtain a minimum 5% of the valid votes to be awarded Councilor positions to candidates from the list. The electoral system is best suited to local administration, as its rigidity prevents a higher incidence of the personality of those eligible against the influence of parties. Preferably an open-list system or at least not blocked.
The number of Councilors to choose is a function of the population: 5 to 250 residents, 7 from 251 to 1,000; 9 from 1,001 to 2,000; 11 from 2,001 to 5,000; 13 from 5,001 to 10,000; 17 from 10,001 to 20,000; 21 from 20,001 to 50,000; 25 from 50,001 to 100,000, and adding a further Councilman per hundred thousand residents or fraction and another if the resulting number was even.
b. The Mayor, who is the Chairman of the City Council. Your choice based on Article 140 of the Spanish Constitution, may be by the council or by the residents but the ordinary legislature ruled that conducted by the neighbors. The election is held by an absolute majority of council members from among those listed as head of the relevant electoral rolls, and only if this system fails, the mayor appoints the first councilman most voted. It also envisages the removal of the Mayor for a constructive vote of censure passed by an absolute majority of council members. This motion, once submitted, should be held on the tenth day following their presentation in a session that is headed by a Bureau of age. The filing of a motion of censure must be proposed by an absolute majority of council members and none of them may sign more than a point during his tenure.
It has also covered the issue of trust which may present the Mayor, in connection with the approval of annual budgets of organic regulation of tax ordinances or plans as appropriate final approval to the Municipality. If the Mayor loses a vote of confidence, he shall cease automatically. If the issue of trust is linked to the approval of budgets, is understood to be granted and approved budgets if, within one month of the issue is lost trust not presented a censure motion or with an alternative candidate if presented this motion does not succeed. To prevent abuse, the law requires that only you can file a motion of confidence in each year, no more than two over the Mayor’s office and is not allowed in the final year of his mandate, or when she has raised a motion to censure until it is voted.
The Deputy Mayor are assistants to the Mayor he appointed among the Aldermen.
c. The Commission of Government, in those municipalities with more than 5,000 residents or its regulations so provide Organic. This chaired by the Mayor, composed of a number of Aldermen not to exceed one-third of the total that corresponds to the Council, appointed or dismissed by the Mayor freely realizing the House.
It also foresees the creation of other committees for study, report or query issues that must correspond to the Mayor, plenary, commissions, or council members who hold government delegations.
d. Other relevant municipal bodies have simple internal delegations of authority unless they can get. Article 116 of the LRBRL envisages the creation of the Special Commission of Auditors in all local entities for the control of the Annual Accounts before submitting to the plenary. In large cities, one can envisage the creation of devolved bodies for better management of certain competencies in different areas or districts such as the Municipal District Boards.
B) The Council Opened.
It is a municipal organization scheme based on direct democracy (Article 140 of the Spanish Constitution). All neighbors are open in an assembly or council, are the key organ of these municipalities, replacing the House. It is typical of small towns. The expected LRBRL Municipalities of less than one hundred people and those who have traditionally recognized to be governed by this system. In these municipalities only provide for elections for the Mayor’s appointment by universal, direct, secret, and by the majority system. The Mayor may appoint from among the neighbors up to three Deputy Mayors to assist him in his duties.
C) Special Schemes of Organization.
a. Towns of Madrid and Barcelona: They are regulated by special laws that provide for a more complex organization. The cities of Ceuta and Melilla are autonomous communities that now are governed by their respective statutes and assume the powers attributed to the general law municipalities and the Provincial Councils.
b. The autonomous legislation may establish special schemes for small towns: The rural character, the tourist, industrial, mining, historical, artistic …
c. Municipalities Councils covered by the relevant legislation of Navarra. And in the Basque Foral regime focuses on the provinces.
4. Municipal Powers.
The European Charter of Local Self-Government provides that the powers of local entities should normally be full and complete, but the Spanish legislature establishes that state law or autonomous sector, according to their skills, determine the scope of the responsibilities of each Entity. Thus, LRBRL establishes the principle of recognition of the right to participate in the exercise of municipal powers to affect the sphere of interests of the local community and recognizes the capacity of the municipality to promote activities and provide services that meet those interests come. And gives the State the power to recognize these minimum competencies of local entities with the character of basic legislation. The defense of the powers of local entities is implemented through jurisdictional conflicts in defense of local autonomy that may be brought against the state or regional laws that undermine the constitutionally guaranteed local autonomy.
Article 7 of the classified LRBRL skills of local entities in themselves, which can only be determined by state law or regional and which are exercised under self and self-responsibility but in coordination with the powers of other public authorities and delegated are exercised under the direction and control of government delegating its powers. The LRBRL contains a list of subjects on which the sector law set its remit. The materials most directly related to neighborhood life are: police, roads, traffic, civil defense, firefighting, water supplies, gas, street lighting, public transport, cultural activities and sports facilities, cooperate with the education authority, etc. Of particular importance is the urban planning and housing, grocery stores, slaughterhouses, markets, fairs, consumer and user protection, and environmental protection.
Of municipal powers are required (Article 26 LRBRL):
a. – Public lighting, cemetery, refuse collection, street cleaning, house water supply, sewerage, access to population centers, paving of roads, and control of food and beverages.
b. – For Municipalities with a population exceeding 5,000 inhabitants: public park, public library, and waste treatment market.
c. – With more than 20,000 population: civil protection, social services, prevention, and firefighting, sports facilities for public use.
d. – In the municipalities with a population over 50,000 inhabitants: urban public passenger transport and environmental protection.
Not all municipalities have economic resources to provide these basic services. Thus the Act provides that a local partnership of Provinces, Autonomous Regions, and the State is directed towards smaller municipalities with financial and managerial capacity. Also at the request of the Autonomous Municipality, to exempt from compliance with the obligation to provide minimum services as an exception.
III. THE PROVINCE.
1. Nature.
Article 141 of the Spanish Constitution establishes a triple nature of the State: Administrative territorial division of the peripheral local authority and electoral district for the general election to the Senate and House of Representatives.
Their historical origin corresponds to the first nature and arises in Spain in 1883. But it evolves into a local entity. As such the province is determined by the group of municipalities and are constitutionally guaranteed its own sphere of interest, intermunicipal character. These interests are not clearly defined as municipal and local entities that are intermediate to their own interests as islands, counties, and metropolitan areas. In the autonomous province and the representation of provincial interests are integrated into the Community itself. The more precise provincial powers defined in legislation only with respect to the cooperation and assistance to the performance of municipal services required.
Following the establishment of the autonomous communities, provinces are considered controversial. The integration of the provincial organization in the province Autonomous Community and the legal configuration of inter-island Associations, bring into question the effectiveness of the constitutional guarantee of the Province.
2. Elements of the Province.
A. The Land and People.
The provincial territory includes the terms of the municipality within the Province. Article 141 of the Spanish Constitution requires, to a greater guarantee of provincial boundaries, that amendment is approved by the Organic Law. The province’s population also includes the municipalities of the province.
B. Organization.
It provides the following bodies:
a. The Plenum, which consists of all provincial deputies, the number is determined by law based on the population, including a minimum of 25 and a maximum of 51. The election system is an extrapolation of the election results produced in the elections for councilors of the municipalities of the province, whose condition is necessarily the provincial deputies.
b. The President is elected by the Members from amongst themselves, by an absolute majority on the first ballot and simple in the second. The President may be removed by constructive censure passed by an absolute majority. Like the Mayor, the President of the Congress may raise the issue of trust related to the adoption or amendment of annual budgets, the Organic Regulations, or the Provincial Plan of Cooperation to works and services under municipal jurisdiction. The President appoints from among the deputies to the Vice.
c. The Governance Committee, which comprises the President and a number of members not exceeding one-third of the total, freely appointed and removed by him and reported to the plenary.
3. Competence.
The current legislation due to the controversy aroused by the province following the establishment of the Autonomous Communities defines only a very limited powers to the provinces, leaving the autonomous legislation outlining the role of the Province in each Autonomous Community. The law of the autonomous process theoretically empowers provinces to becoming administrators managing the powers of the Autonomous Communities in the Province. This also reflects most of the Statutes of Autonomy. But this has generally been unenforceable, except in very specific sectoral circumstances.
Moreover, Article 37 of the intersubjective LRBRL provides for delegation, which requires the acceptance of same by the county council. The Autonomous Community may “instruct” imperative to the County to manage their responsibilities. The Autonomous Community may issue instructions on how to exercise the powers. The LRBRL no provision in either the course or the delegation of powers assigned to what should be the financing system of management, though obviously must correspond to the Autonomous Community.
The state legislature intended to empower the Provincial Councils through indirect management of the powers of the Autonomous Communities, which also include the generality of the Statute. The powers of the Provincial Councils established in the LRBRL are scarce and poorly defined. Article 36 of the Act provides as follows:
a. The coordination of municipal services between themselves for the management of comprehensive and adequate provision to referred to in paragraph a) of item 2 of Article 31.
b. The assistance and cooperation in legal, economic, and technical assistance to municipalities, especially those from lower economic capacity and management.
c. The provision of public services intermunicipal nature and, where appropriate, overflows.
d. The promotion and administration of the peculiar interests of the Province.
The sectoral legislation, state or autonomous which will define specific areas to which it must meet municipal action. The Second Transitional Provision of LRBRL provides that until legislation is passed sector, provinces retain the powers that the legislation at the time of entry into force of LRBRL attributed to them.
4. Special Schemes.
A. The Uniprovincial Community.
The statutes of these communities have provided for the extinction of the provincial organization and is reflected in Article 9 of the Autonomy Process Act and Article 40 of LRBRL.
The representation, governance, and administration of provincial interests, powers, and financial resources for the Provincial plays the Autonomous Community. The eventual creation of Region oblige us to reconsider this approach puts most of the provincial powers, which would be absorbed by the Community.
B. Canary Provinces.
The Canary Islands are included in a single province was divided in two: Las Palmas and Tenerife, by the Provincial Statute of 1925, that organized inter-Associations of County Councils in place, and integrated to the Island Councils created in 1912.
The statute provided for the transfer canary skills, media, and resources to the Canarian Autonomous Community, as well as personnel of the Provincial Associations of Las Palmas and Tenerife. This involved the disappearance of the provincial organization of the archipelago, which was unconstitutional. The LRBRL established a remedy whereby the inter-Associations remained as organs of representation and expression of provincial interests comprising the Presidents of the Island Councils of the Province.
C. The Basque Provinces.
Has happened to the Provincial Council of Alava, Guipuzcoa, and Vizcaya. Are governed by their traditional Foral regime, the Statute of Autonomy of the Basque Country, the Law of Autonomy, and the provinces themselves and, additionally, by the Provincial Regime LRBRL. They are guaranteed by the First Additional Provision of the Constitution.
IV. THE ISLAND.
The islands of the Canary Islands have a special local organization that is with the Island Council. The same regime was extended to the Balearic Islands, with the Island Council nombrde.
The Island Councils, as the governing body and administration are governed by the rules of the Provincial Councils the powers conferred upon them, in addition to the Statute and the Canarian autonomous legislation attributes to them. The election of Directors is made directly by the electors of the municipalities of the island, by the same system as that of the Aldermen, in a separate ballot box and the same day as local elections. The President is the head of the list with most votes in the election as Directors of the Chapter.
Balearic Island of Directors are also governed by the rules of the County Councils on the Status of the Balearic Islands and the corresponding autonomous legislation. Its electoral system is governed by the Balearic Autonomous Community legislation, since the councils are composed of deputies elected to Parliament in the Balearic island.
V. Other Local Bodies.
1. Entities Infra.
Local authorities have historically existed for the administration of local public interest in the scattered villages and distinct from the nucleus in which sits the capital of the municipality. They are: the villages, parishes, villages, districts, parvis, councils, parishes, and so on., All contained in the name of Minor Local Authority by the Statute of 1924.
Its creation is attributed to the autonomous region by a procedure which includes the City Council hearing in which the entity is located. His organization integrates a directly elected mayor (village headman) and a board appointed among the residents of the Entity under the results of municipal elections, except to provide for the open council system. They represent a decentralized municipal organization and have legal personality. Its powers are affecting the city and are provided in the Entity and the management of their heritage and community property.
2. Entities Supra.
a. The Shire (Articles 141.3 and 152.3 of the Spanish Constitution). Creation is expected by the Autonomous Communities and its regulation by the autonomous legislation essential. With the exception of the islands and Navarre, the generality of the statutes provide for the possibility of creating Region.
Is a local entity with legal personality established for the management of common interest to several municipalities in the same area defined by ties of geography, economic, and cultural specificities. The doctrine is considered as a solution for municipal reform of Small Towns. The Constitutional Court finds that our Constitution prohibits the creation of Municipalities-District her absorption of the municipalities that includes the Shire. The County appears as a supra-entity hybrid nature between the municipalities and the Province. Its powers are regulated by the autonomous and complementary legislation with which members can delegate the Municipalities and the Province. Article 42.4 of LRBRL includes the provision of minimum services and interventions in the powers generally conferred on them by Article 25 of that Act the Shire has an important role in uniprovincial community because phasing in them the Provincial allow their powers were largely carried out by the Shire rather than being borne by the Community.
The LRBRL governs the procedure for creating the region, which is the decision of the Autonomous Communities, and the definition, organization, skills, and economic resources should be established by law autonomic.
b. Metropolitan areas. Local authorities are who enjoyed great prestige as organizations for urban management and service skills common to the municipality within the large urban conurbations. With the nature of local entity created the Barcelona Metropolitan Municipal Entity, and the character of state institutional entities, the Committee for Planning and Coordination of Madrid, the Corporation of Greater Bilbao, and Valencia Grand Corporation.
The LRBRL states in Article 43 the creation by the Autonomous Metropolitan Areas. And the Local Government defined as comprising the municipalities of large urban centers of population whose economic and social links exist necessitating joint planning and coordination of certain services. Its regulation refers to the autonomous legislation.
3. The Associations of Municipalities.
The Associations have an associative character, creating a voluntary basis by the municipalities for the joint management of services or works within its competence.
The basic rule for these entities is its Statute, which must contain the name of the Commonwealth, its territory, its aim or purpose, the powers attributed to him, government, operating rules, system of economic resources, and term of the entity.
Is legally separate and independent from the municipalities who create it. The creation process is regulated by the autonomous legislation, although Article 44 of LRBRL fixed some criteria for the approval of its statutes. The development or amendment of the Regulations is carried out by an Assembly composed of all municipal council members are associated. The draft Statute is subject to corresponding report of the Provincial Council, and full of all the municipalities must approve it. In the case of suppression of the Commonwealth the process is similar.
Are prohibited Associations of Provinces since it is a space reserved for the authorities of the Autonomous Communities.
4. Associative Entities Supraprovincial Character.
The LRBRL sets up partners from the local governments at both State and autonomous. This created the Spanish Federation of Municipalities and Provinces of nature only associations, whose law of associations is applied in a supplementary. Its purpose is to promote and defend the interests of local partners and representation of those interests to the state or autonomous administrations.
IV. Relationship Between Local and Regional Government and State.
The unity of the state implies that no administration is like a watertight compartment or that neither may be adopted an administrative policy completely independent of other public administrations. This is because there are a plurality of public interests that need coordination. On the other hand, the government is always the ultimate responsibility in fulfilling public functions, regardless of outside government that the exercise. So there are a number of techniques of protection exerted by the State Administration against the Local.
The model of decentralized territorial State which recognizes and guarantees local autonomy, has responded to the need for collaboration between public administrations and livelihood of controls on local government.
First, the two-faced nature of Local Government on the relations of local entities do not occur exclusively with the state administration but also with the Autonomous Administration. But in any case, it is needed the intervention of the state administration because it also bears the efforts of Local Authorities since the activity of state government as a whole must be coordinated among all of them.
Second, the relationship between Local Government and the State, and the relevant autonomous, should not be limited exclusively to cases of potential conflict, but should be based on consideration of regular performance, based on the principles of collaboration, coordination, and cooperation. Article 55 provides LRBRL reciprocal duties between the three levels of administration:
a. Respect the legitimate exercise by the authorities of their responsibilities and the consequences arising thereof for themselves.
b. Weighing on the performance of the powers of all the public interests involved and, in particular those whose management is entrusted to the other administrations.
c. To allow other administrations for their own management information that is relevant to the proper development by them of their duties.
d. Provide, within itself, cooperation and active assistance of other authorities may be needed for the effective discharge of their duties.
Third, regular checks of the activity of local entities have judicialized no longer took up residence in upper administrations but in court, before which these administrations are entitled to bring the appropriate resources.
1. Coordination Relationship.
To ensure coordination provides the following techniques:
a. Mutual information.
a.1. Referral by Local Entities of an extract or copy of his actions and agreements to the authorities of the State and the Autonomous Community (Article 56.1 of LRBRL).
a.2. Department of State or Autonomous Administration for information on municipal activities (Article 56.2 of LRBRL)
a.3. Duty of State and Regional administration to provide information about their plans, and construction management programs and services to local entities that affect them. (Article 56.3 LRBRL)
b. Planning or give binding instructions. Established by Article 59.1 of the Act states that the coordination LRBRL to define concretely the public interests on a matter, and determine the order of priorities, the effect may approve sectoral plans for a specific matter within the framework of which must exercised the powers of planning, programming, regulation, and action of local entities affected.
c. Organic, by creating the appropriate governing bodies or advisory partnership, of the Autonomous Communities, provincial, general or sector (Article 58 of LRBRL).
2. Partnerships Between the State Administration and Local Bodies. The National Commission of Local Government.
How these relationships are general organizational structure for collaboration between the State and Local Government. This has created the National Commission of Local Government, which is an organ of the Central State Administration under the Ministry of Public Administration, whose mission is to advise the State administration in local matters, make proposals and suggestions financial Affecting Local Government projects and report the State Law and Regulations Affecting Local Government, and entrusted to any other laws. His organization is bipartite, integral approach to representatives of the State Administration and Local Government under the chairmanship of Minister for Public Administrations. Its decisions are taken by consensus, obtaining the will of the Local Government representing the absolute majority.
The Commission may request challenge state laws or are harmful to devolved local autonomy. This is a simple request and not an award of a qualification to bring the action.
At the provincial level are the Provincial Commissions State Collaborating with local corporations composed of equal representation. The existence of these entities does not exclude the possibility that other different autonomous legislation believed to organize the collaboration between his administration and local bodies in its territory.
3. Cooperative relations.
Voluntary nature for local bodies. May be technical, economic or legal. It is the inherent jurisdiction of the Provincial Councils and is implemented through the Provincial Planning and Cooperation Island works and services under municipal jurisdiction. Regulated by Article 36 of LRBRL and developed by Royal Decree 1.328/1997 which provides that government cooperation is implemented through the Local Economic Cooperation Program of the State, included in the General State Budget.
The plans are drawn up by the Provincial Councils, except in Catalonia. They are informed by the National Commission of Local Government. The works and services included in them are financed by the State, the Autonomous Communities, the structural funds of the European Communities, contributions from the Provincial and Municipal themselves affected. Some autonomous regions have their own system of cooperation with local authorities through regional cooperation funds and solidarity funds municipal special action.
4. Foreign control and conflict.
The existence of administrative controls on local activity is not incompatible with the autonomy of local entities. It adopted a series of laws that eliminated a large number of state controls on the municipalities that characterized the Franco legislation. This legislation began a process control judicialization any regular on local authorities by the State Administration or the Autonomous Communities, which culminated in the LRBRL. Spanish legislation has gone beyond what is considered constitutionally admissible by the Constitutional Court and the forecasts of the European Charter of local autonomy. The Constitutional Court has come to regard as the basic law that the suspension of agreements of local entities only matter for the courts, so any forecast of the autonomous legislation conferring such difficulties to the Autonomous Communities is zero, although it is recognized the Autonomous Communities have the power to provisionally suspend local acts to the challenge before the courts.
The State administration or autonomy to consider that an act violates a local law, may order him to take appropriate measures or challenge such acts before the Administrative Courts, which may also do if the order is not served in a month. If such actions undermine the powers of the state or autonomous administration may challenge them directly before the same court and request the suspension of the act.
The LRBRL envisage three cases of direct intervention by the State Administration or Autonomous Community:
a. Would be breached by the local authority obligations under the Act and breach of which directly affects the exercise of powers of the State or Autonomous Body.
b. If a local authority to take actions and agreements that serious injury to the general interest of Spain, Delegate of the Government, after formal notice to the President of the Institution within ten days of its receipt, and if not attended may suspend and take appropriate measures to protect that interest, having appealed no later than ten days before the administrative courts.
c. When the performance of local entities is seriously harmful to the interests of the State, assuming the breach of constitutional obligations. The Council of Ministers, by notifying the Council of the Autonomous Government, carry out the dissolution of the governing bodies of the entity, to be adopted by royal decree after approval by the Senate.
Local corporations are subject to review by the Court of Auditors. This control is compatible with the regime of intervention and consequent control of spending with their own local government, and also with the control system of accounts that the Autonomous Communities may establish for its public sector, attributing it to a special autonomous body.
The conflict also involves relations of local actions in defense of their rights and interests against the government of the State or the Autonomous Communities. They can go to the administrative courts. With the agreement of 1,998 local conflicts were introduced in defense of local autonomy, these conflicts can be raised against rules with the force of state law that injures or autonomous local autonomy.