The government will next month ask Brussels to hand over 713 million euros that were withheld from the Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR), the minister of territorial cohesion said on Wednesday.
“As recently revealed, the remaining contracts have already been signed to perform tasks equivalent to the third and fourth payment requests. Therefore, next month we will ask for the delivery of the 713 million euros that have been kept in Brussels. Now we can focus on fulfilling the conditions for submitting the fifth payment request,” said Manuel Castro Almeida.
The government official spoke at the annual meeting of the Recovery and Resilience Plan, which takes place this Wednesday in Lisbon, where he also said that work worth more than two billion euros must begin in the coming months if the country does not want to lose funds.
The Minister considered it necessary to compensate for delays in the application of the PRR, and also emphasized that within the framework of “Portugal 2030” the government has set a goal “that at the end of this year, 2024, the processing of applications should not take more than 60 days and that payments should not exceed 30 days “
“Well, I am confident that at the end of this year the PRR will meet an even more ambitious timeline than those set for Portugal 2030,” he assured, given that in terms of timelines the PRR will have to make a “180-degree turn.” “.
Castro Almeida emphasized that many of the PRR’s goals must be agreed upon “immediately with the final beneficiaries, under penalty of failure to meet the deadlines,” especially those related to schools, health centers, housing and university dormitories.
Civil construction worth more than two billion euros will be started in the coming months, which is “not an easy task,” the minister said.
“If contracts for this investment are not signed by early summer and if tenders for the work are not issued in the coming days, we will not be able to start construction next autumn. And then this won’t happen. We can guarantee that deadlines will be met,” he said.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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