The Government will propose a 38% increase in electricity and gas at the hearings, which Kirchnerism will not attend

From June, there will be a new climb at electricity and gas rates, which will begin to materialize from public hearing will do next Sunday.

On Tuesday will address the removal of gas subsidies, on Wednesday the distribution of electricity and on Thursday it will be time to debate how to split the increases, perhaps. the most controversial audience of all.

angNeither the Secretary of Energy, Darío Martínez, nor the Undersecretary of Electric Power, Federico Basualdo, will attend the hearings. In this way, the Minister of Economy, Martín Guzmán, is isolated in this second round of public service rate increases.

The increases will vary depending on the income category. For the 10% of households with the highest incomes, the increases could go from 200% to 400%because they must pay the full amount of gas and electricity that they consume

The volume of customers -about 80%– will experience an increase of 38% since June, at least in the light. That emerges from documents from the Undersecretary of Electric Power presented in the hearing file, which is reference material.

The Ministry of Economy denied this increase and put it at 17%.

The 38% increase will be added to the 20% increase they have been paying since March, which will have a total 65% increase from next month compared to last year, according to official works.

Since between January and February there are no increases, and from March to May the increase is 20%, an increase of 65% for the next 7 months will help close the annual average of 42.7% defined by the Government as recomposition for most customers.

Ang social tariff users they will have a 6% increase in light, while they will not see an increase in gas, according to official sources.

Officials lined up with Vice President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner They will not participate in the hearings.

Lack of kirchnerist

The Undersecretary of Electric Power, Frederic Basualdo, will not attend any of those meetings. Although submitted a job with a position in his dependencythe Undersecretary of Energy Planning (who arranges the hearing) it is not considered for the increase in the majority of users. Even Darío Martínez, Secretary of Energy.

From Economy they sent a document to Basualdo which marked the differences, according to the internal note between Economy and the Undersecretary of Electric Power.

Faced with the concern that Economy reveals about a block on future increases by auditors —Federico Bernal, in Enargas (gas) and Soledad Manín, in Enre (electricity)-, from those offices they indicate that will follow the orders issued by the Secretary of Energywhose owner is Darío Martínez.

The partial removal of subsidies is equivalent to an increase in rates, which will vary according to different income categories and geolocation of households.

For 10% of households with the highest income, the increase could be 400%, according to documents from the Ministry of Energy recorded in the information to be discussed at the public hearing.

“For the winter season there will be 400% increases in the charges of AMBA’s residential users,” said a document from the Undersecretary of Electric Power. In this way, it identifies the clients to whom the “segmentation” will be applied.

In the first job, determined that there are 250,000 households located in high -income areas (13 neighborhoods of Buenos Aires and northern suburbs, including gated communities).

Laterthe Undersecretary of Strategic Planning included another element: households whose income exceeds 3.5 total basic basket (CBT), i.e., who charge more than $ 300,000 per month.

One task carried out by the Undersecretariat of Electric Power for segmentation was Guzmán refused. “The requested report (….) does not provide technical support necessary to advance the proposal put forward by the Secretary of Energy ”, Economy told Basuldo.

Instead, they let him know that adopted reports made by the undersecretary of Energy Planning (led by Andres Lopez Osornioa trusted official of Guzmán) and of the Ministry of Finance.

From Energy Planning they say that the removal of subsidies may be delayed. The idea of ​​†‹вЂ‹ the Ministry of Economy is to apply the new rate schedule from June 1.

At the official party, officials introducing the Vice President considered that the increase will bring more harm than good. Although this will result in a reduction in the subsidy, will force all distributors in the country to charge their customers more for gas and electricity that they consume And it will affect inflation.

Bernal (Enargas) and Manín (Enre) were two officials loyal to Kirchnerism. They insisted that “they will abide by the orders of the Ministry of Energy. Regulatory entities do not establish tariff schedulesbut they apply what is implied to them from the positions that decide the tariff policy ”.

Enre controls the Edenor and Edesur concessions, in the city of Buenos Aires. But, in other parts of the country, the green light for increases should be given by provincial governments which monitors the distributors of each province.

In Buenos Aires, half of Edesur’s clients pay less than $ 1,000 per month for their bill. In the next setting, your ticket will be $ 1,866 per month, according to the undersecretary of Energy Planning. Something similar will happen to Edenor’s clients (close to 40%) who also disbursed less than $ 1,000 over the summer.

Power distributors have to pass on to customers a larger portion of the actual cost of electricity (this is called the seasonal price of electricity or PEST), according to the documents to be discussed at the hearing. According to the Undersecretary of Electric Power, from June the majority of clients in Formosa will increase by 58%, 48% in Buenos Aires (Edelap), 48% in Santa Cruz (SPSE Santa Cruz), or 45% in Mendoza.

NE