Meritxell Roigé, Tortosa’s former mayor and former president of GUMTSA, defended the municipal urban planning company’s decision to retain consultant Efial while giving evidence at Spain’s National Court in Madrid on Thursday 15 October.

Roigé said GUMTSA inherited the consultancy arrangement from the previous administration and renewed it because of a shortage of technical staff during a period of substantial construction work. The testimony matters for Tortosa residents because the Ajuntament is participating in the Efial case as a private prosecutor and has submitted evidence examining whether outsourced work could have been carried out by municipal staff.

GUMTSA is Tortosa City Council’s municipal urban planning company. Roigé was its president from 2007 to 2018, according to reporting on the hearing.

Roigé cites lack of technical staff

Roigé told the court that Efial provided accounting, treasury, administrative, economic and financial services, as well as support for construction projects and urban planning schemes.

“There were few human resources available for all that had to be carried out at the time,” Roigé said, describing why technical staff had recommended retaining the external services.

She said she did not know whether specific reports existed to justify the outsourcing. Efial stopped working for Tortosa City Council in 2014, after the investigation into alleged contracting irregularities became public. Roigé said GUMTSA subsequently took on the work with its own staff, after its workforce increased and the volume of construction work fell.

Roigé also told the court that nobody had warned her that using a negotiated procedure without public advertising for an Efial contract worth €350,000 was unlawful. The contract was later extended.

Expert finds cost difference but no proven final loss

The City Council submitted an economic assessment of three Efial contracts as evidence. The expert said the work could have been performed by municipal staff or by filling vacant posts, but could not establish a definitive financial loss or prove that the contracts were illegal.

  • For one 2008 contract, the assessment put the estimated difference between outsourcing and a public-sector alternative at €482,625.57.
  • Roigé said Efial received €637,000 in invoices between 2009 and 2010, which she linked to GUMTSA’s workload and need for advice.
  • Evidence heard at the trial included €184,397.99 invoiced by Efial in 2012, of which €136,973 was recorded directly against construction works rather than passing through the profit and loss account.

Daniel Nogueroles, Tortosa City Council’s comptroller between November 2010 and September 2013, also gave evidence. He said he had warned municipal leaders that Efial was both managing GUMTSA’s spending and auditing its accounts, without coordination with the council’s financial-control department.

“From my point of view, the main legal problem was that they acted as the material managers of expenditure and the general management of the company, while at the same time auditing the accounts,” Nogueroles said.

Nogueroles said he had raised the issue in the council’s 2011 general accounts report and that the then mayor, Ferran Bel, and Roigé were aware of it. The court is examining the evidence and has not established that the contracts were unlawful or caused a final financial loss.

Reported by reusdigital.cat, laciutat.cat, Redacció Ebredigital.cat, per Canal 21 Ebre.