The Council of Mallorca's 2021 budget, subject to approval by a meeting of the full council, will increase by 11.6 million euros to 494 million.
The largest budget ever, the president, Catalina Cladera said on Friday that half will go on social policies, for which there is to be increased spending of 25 million euros. The 494 million may rise to 520 million because of the relaxation of Spanish government's rules regarding the use of outstanding credit.
Of other spending, there will be 124.1 million euros for economic policies, 42.6 million euros for environmental policies and 20 million for a Covid reactivation fund. Personnel costs will rise by 8.5% to 13.32 million. This is largely due to the recruitment of more staff by the IMAS institute for social affairs in response to the pandemic. The IMAS will have a budget of 222.7 million euros.
Other specific amounts for departments are: mobility and infrastructure (99.2 million); finance and public function (57 million); culture and heritage (25.8 million); the presidency (18.9 million); tourism and sport (16.6 million); sustainability (11.2 million); and territory (9.4 million).
The finance councillor, Josep Lluís Colom, said that the budgets for culture, mobility and tourism and sports have decreased - four per cent in the case of tourism and sport and six per cent for the other two.
Cladera explained that 285.3 million of the total budget comes from the regional government and 141 million from the state. The Council's own income will be 46 million, while there will be 21.7 million euros of debt finance. Between 2012 and 2019, the Council's debt was reduced to such an extent that there was only a small outstanding amount left this year. Because of this "healthy situation", new debt is being taken on, and this is because of a decrease in the Balearic government's contribution.