The Lazio Regional Prosecutor’s Office of the Court of Auditors continues its work to shed light on what might be the biggest scam once morest the State: the citizen’s income. According to estimates, we are talking regarding approximately 1.7 billion euros paid to individuals who did not meet the requirements. In reality, according to assessments, still underway, the sum might reach a range of astronomical proportions, practically a financial maneuver, between 8 and 10 billion euros.
We recall that the total disbursement for the citizen’s income was 20 billion euros for approximately 2 million families, for a total of 4.65 million people, with an average check of 552 euros. In particular, the focus of the Prosecutor’s Office is on the system of disbursement of the sums during the management of Pasquale Tridico. An accreditation mechanism that, for the whole of 2019, only provided for ex post checks, that is, following having disbursed the sums, would have also allowed non-qualified individuals to receive a monthly income.
Also because it would seem that INPS and the Ministry of Labor had introduced, at the dawn of the measure, a “solve et repete” mechanism, that is, first you pay and then you check. Let’s make one thing clear right away: there are no investigations underway nor are there any suspects. The preliminary investigation decree, sent to the social security institution, is aimed at shedding light on some internal mechanisms that regulated the disbursement of the sums. Initially, 24 questions had been sent to INPS to which the institution was called upon to respond with a detailed report. The social security institution responded to this request with the utmost openness, making itself available to provide all the necessary answers.
Indeed, given that it would have taken more than a year of work to answer the questions, INPS sent a counter-proposal to the Court of Auditors’ Prosecutor’s Office.
In other words: tell us what you need to know and we will answer. That is why the 24 questions have been replaced by a series of discussions (one of which will be held in Rome next week) to reduce response times.
With this direct relationship, the time would therefore go from a year to a few months, some qualified sources say that all the requested documentation might be provided by the beginning of autumn. But what did the accounting magistrates specifically ask for? The number and amount of the sums paid out, catalogued by year and territory. A list of all the undue benefits and the activities started to recover those sums. The amount of what was actually recovered, always broken down by year and territory. And what initiatives the social security institution implemented to understand the reasons why the system of management and control of the applications to obtain the citizen’s income did not work. But also the personal details of the managers responsible for implementing the management procedures for the disbursement of the subsidy and Billions of euros The total amount allocated by the government to finance the citizen’s income of those who had the management of the control system. Clarifications that will be used by the Court of Auditors to identify any responsibilities and calculate the damage to the treasury. This calculation must include not only the amounts paid to those who were not entitled to them, but also the legal and administrative costs incurred by the public body to recover undue benefits. In addition to the losses caused by the delay in recovery procedures. It is not the first time that the Court of Auditors has tried to understand the extent of any financial damage, but the last report requested from INPS prepared by Tridico had not satisfied the Prosecutor’s Office. Also because, until then, the “defense” of the social security institution was based on the fact that the checks were the responsibility of the Municipalities and not the institution on Via Ciro il Grande.
A thesis that the accounting magistrates do not seem to have taken into consideration. But what figures are we talking regarding? In the indictment of the former magistrate of the Court of Auditors, Antonio Buccarelli, who in 2022 had denounced the malfunctioning of the 5 Star measure, 791,380,228.22 euros are calculated for the years 2021-2022 and an estimate for the years 2019-2020 of around 900 million. The sums would have been unduly granted despite the lack of requirements to obtain them. But why would there have been these flaws in the accreditation and control system at Tridico’s INPS? An answer can be provided by a survey by the Confcommercio Research Office of 2022 which showed how “under the same conditions, if the share of recipients had grown by 1% in absolute terms, the percentage of votes for the 5 Star Movement would have risen by 2.4%”. In practice, if in a territory the percentage of recipients had gone from 3 to 4%, the votes for the grillini would have risen from 10 to 12.4%. And this might also explain the haemorrhage of votes, regarding 2 million in all of Italy, which especially in the South has hit the Orphan Movement of the Citizen’s Income.
FdI MP Walter Rizzetto, who has been dealing with the INPS dossier since the beginning, has no doubts: «Let’s say that everyone disposes of human and state resources as they see fit. I think that the M5S used the citizen’s income as a sort of electoral measure». And the fact that there were many illicit recipients was seen with the introduction of the inclusion allowance which «relaunched the job market» he underlined. Another alarm bell is given by the fact that many of the former recipients of the income did not join the training courses, which were paid (350 euros per month). These are probably those who worked illegally despite receiving the income. «Moreover, compared to the citizen’s income, the inclusion allowance is worth on average 100 to 120 euros more» concluded the FdI MP. No one doubts that in Italy there are segments of the population that need financial support, but for this very reason it was necessary to check to ensure that they went into the right pockets.
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2024-07-12 06:33:40