Lula government launches promotion to attract amendments to the PAC – 11/25/2023 – Power

The Lula (PT) government launched an offensive to try to attract parliamentary amendments in order to finance its main showcase, the New PAC (Growth Acceleration Program).

The strategies include the guarantee that the appeal of the amendments will not be contingent and even federal counterparts, such as “pay 2, get 3” — a model by which the Executive promises to build an additional project for a certain action embraced by a parliamentary amendment.

The actions signal an attempt by the federal government to have greater control over the Union Budget, after a period of increasing competence and resources transfer to Congress, mainly during the Jair Bolsonaro (PL) years.

Amendment is the way congressmen send money to finance works and projects in their electoral strongholds. The National Congress has made progress in recent years to increasingly increase the value of this budget and take control over it.

In Planalto’s assessment, it is necessary to concentrate and direct resources to the strategic actions outlined by the government, thus preventing the money from being distributed in a dispersed manner.

This week, the Chief Minister of the Civil House, Rui Costa (PT), and the Chief Minister of the Institutional Relations Secretariat, Alexandre Padilha (PT) participated in a meeting at Palácio do Planalto with coordinators of state benches to present options for directions from bench amendments to PAC projects.

A Sheet had access to a presentation made available to parliamentarians.

In the document, Planalto mentions the possibility of transfers via amendments to the areas of health, housing and education, among others. And it highlights the advantages of allocating these resources to New PAC projects.

In relation to the health area, a department headed by Nísia Trindade, there is the possibility of transferring resources for the construction of polyclinics, specialized diagnostic support units, UBS (Basic Health Units) and for the purchase of ambulances from Samu, among others actions.

The Lula administration offers financial compensation from the Ministry of Health if there is a contribution from a bench amendment —those allocated jointly by parliamentarians from a given state— for a specific case, the construction of polyclinics.

In this case, parliamentarians will have a kind of “pay 2, get 3” option. The Executive will finance one additional unit for every two selected polyclinics that receive bench amendments. One of the requirements is that the amendment represents the total value of the project.

Some parliamentarians joked behind the scenes that the government was holding a “Black Friday” to try to attract amendments.

“Only the polyclinic will receive financial compensation from the MS [Ministério da Saúde] if it receives a bench amendment. The federal government will finance an additional polyclinic, with resources from the Ministry of Health, for every two selected polyclinics that received bench amendments”, states the presentation.

The construction of polyclinics was chosen to have this counterpart because it is a higher-value enterprise that serves the population of a larger geographic area, not just one city. Furthermore, specialized care is identified as a priority for Health.

This is also the case of a project in which the government’s offer does not exceed the needs of the federated entities. There are currently 321 requests for polyclinics filed. Depending on the type, each one can cost R$15 million or R$22.4 million.

Palace assistants deny that the government is making a kind of “fair” by offering compensation. But they consider that the incentives will have a beneficial effect, both for parliamentarians, who will have their names linked to more works, and for the government, which will be able to direct more resources to its priorities.

They claim that many works currently stopped in the country are the result of poorly used amendments.

The Civil House officially informed that the initiative to seek amendments for PAC works did not come unilaterally from the federal government. According to the ministry, it came about after many parliamentarians expressed that they would like to contribute with the resources.

“The Civil House reinforces the importance of combining efforts to direct public resources to strategic works for the country, drawn up based on specific criteria and prioritizing equipment that is most in demand and has the greatest impact on the population”, informed the ministry.

“In this sense, the National Congress signaled its interest in contributing to this moment of resumption of public investment and, therefore, the possibility of applying resources via parliamentary amendment in the New PAC was presented”, he adds.

Another case of government compensation will be with sports centers. In this case, the rule will apply to each parliamentarian’s individual amendments. For every three projects covered by parliamentary amendments, the federal government promises to build one more.

There are currently 4,080 proposals for sports centers filed by federated entities, each costing around R$1.5 million. The government, however, imposed a limit of one hundred units for this type of modality.

Also in cases of individual amendments for the health area, if the parliamentarian allocates it to works identified as priorities by the government —among those already qualified— he may indicate another qualified one, of equal or lesser value, which will be financed by the Ministry of Health .

“If the proposal that receives a parliamentary amendment is among those selected, the parliamentarian will be guaranteed the indication of another proposal, as long as it is among those qualified in that modality”, states the Planalto material.

“This second indication will be financed with the Ministry of Health’s own resources, as long as it is in the same modality and with a type of value equal to or lower than the first proposal indicated.”

In addition to cases in which there are counterparts, the government presented as an advantage the fact that bench amendments will not be subject to contingencies, that the projects have already been approved by the technical areas and that the PAC management will monitor the execution, quickly resolving any obstacles. bureaucratic.

Not all parliamentarians who participated in the meeting were satisfied. Some criticized what they consider to be an attempt by the government to induce them to convince their colleagues in the direction of the amendments.

One of them also says that it is legitimate for the government to want to encourage the PAC, but states that the state benches are plural and not necessarily all parliamentarians are aligned with the Executive.

In August of this year, the federal government launched the New PAC, with a forecast of R$1.4 trillion in investments by December 2026. Of this total, around R$370 billion will come from resources from the General Budget of the Union It is precisely this slice that the government intends to strengthen or share the account with the National Congress.