A Supreme Court ruling against the Government will trigger the cost of rescuing broken highways

Currently, the Executive has estimated the rescue of eight of these nine highways at 1,021 million euros, an amount resulting from subtracting from the cost of the works and the expropriations the investments that the infrastructure still requires, the compensation paid for expropriations and the amounts necessary for the Administration to take charge of future payments.

Despite the fact that there is still a margin with respect to the total cost that the Executive anticipated, of 3,305 million euros, the setback of the Supreme Court partially knocks down the formula that was approved to calculate this amount, so the total bill could trigger this figure. In addition, there is no appeal against these sentences.

According to the latest sentences consulted by Europa Press, some of the formulas used by the Government to calculate that cost have been annulled, after the Supreme Court has decided so, considering that they were not appropriate.

For example, the 25% paid by the Administration to the expropriated cannot be reduced from the amount to be paid to the companies, or the day on which the road was put into service or on which the collection began will be estimated as the beginning of the amortization. of tolls.

It will also be taken into account that the investments made by the State to fine-tune the rescued roads will never refer to the state they were in when they were opened, but rather to the state they were in when they were liquidated.

In total, there are nine judgments that partially uphold the claims of the companies, seven of them in response to the appeals filed by the seven concessionaires of the nine highways, another filed directly by Sacyr, ACS and Iberpistas (Abertis) and another by Bankia, which was also part of a concession.

Specifically, radial 4 (Ferrovial and Sacyr), the M-12 (OHL), the AP-41 (Isolux Corsán, Comsa, Sando and Azvi), the AP-36 (Ferrovial, Europistas and Budimex), the radial 3 and 5 (built under a single company formed by Abertis, Sacyr, ACS), radial 2 (Abertis, ACS, Acciona and Globalvía) and AP-7 on the Alicante ring road (ACS, Abertis and Globalvía) and between municipalities of Cartagena, in Murcia, and Vera, in Almería (Globalvía ​​and Ploder).

The most expensive bailouts are those of the roads located outside Madrid, as is the case of the AP-36 Ocaña-La Roda (Albacete), which amounts to 320 million euros, although the State has already paid 411 million in a first resolution provisional; that of the Alicante ring road, which amounts to 308 million; and that of Cartagena-Vera, of another 283 million euros.

Already in Madrid, the cost of rescuing Radials 3 and 5, designed to decongest traffic on the Valencia and Extremadura highways, amounts to 119 million, that of the AP-41 to Toledo to 53 million and that of the M- 12 to Madrid Barajas Airport at 46 million euros.

At the moment, that of the R-4 is zero euros, given that the amount withheld by the Executive to meet future payments is higher than the real cost of the infrastructure. For its part, the ninth highway, the R-2, has not yet obtained its Patrimonial Responsibility of the Administration (RPA).