Junts per Catalunya has filed a parliamentary request seeking details of the Generalitat’s school climate-control plan in the Penedès, including the selection criteria, timetable and funding.

For pupils, families and councils in the Penedès, the unanswered questions concern whether classrooms will receive full cooling systems or more limited measures, and whether municipalities will be asked to meet any of the cost. Junts is calling for the Generalitat, Catalonia’s regional government, to fund the work in full.

The party’s Penedès branch said on Sunday that the Department of Education had not provided sufficient information about the programme or its planned reach across state schools and publicly funded private schools.

Questions on coverage, equipment and funding

In its parliamentary initiative, Junts asks the Generalitat to specify:

  • the criteria used to choose the first schools and classrooms for cooling work;
  • the deadline for completing the programme and whether it will extend to all schools;
  • whether centres will receive comprehensive climate-control installations, air-conditioning equipment or fans; and
  • the budget for the work and whether town halls will have to contribute.
“Choosing a school whose classrooms are already climate-controlled shows that they have no criteria, do not even know the condition of schools in the Penedès, and make announcements without being on the ground,” Junts per Catalunya’s Penedès branch said.

Santa Fe del Penedès cited in the request

Junts said the Department of Education had included the school in Santa Fe del Penedès among centres selected for climate-control work, despite the local council having already paid to cool the school using municipal funds. The party raised the case as a question over how authorities would deal with councils that had already financed installations themselves.

The parliamentary request also asks whether those councils would recover money spent before the Generalitat’s programme. Junts has not stated that reimbursement has been agreed or promised.

The party is seeking full regional funding for schools in Alt Penedès and Baix Penedès, two counties in the Penedès area, as well as Garraf, on the coast south of Barcelona, and Anoia, the inland county that includes Igualada.

Primary sources: Generalitat de Catalunya, Govern de la Generalitat de Catalunya. Reported by infoanoia.cat.