After a long and even bitter debate between the majority and the opposition, the Calabria Regional Council approved the centre-right bill which regulates the role of undersecretaries to the Presidency, reintroduced with the amendment to the Statute which took place at the end of January. It was presented by the majority group leaders Mattiani (Lega), who was the speaker in the chamber, Giannetta (Forza Italia), Pitaro (Noi Moderati), Caputo (Occhiuto President) and Brutto (Fratelli d’Italia).
The text, which responds – we read in the report – “to the need to coordinate the regional legislation in force with the statutory provisions”, provides that “the president of the Regional Council can appoint up to two undersecretaries to the Presidency of the Regional Council, also choosing them from outside the members of the Regional Council. The undersecretaries assist the president of the regional council in carrying out the tasks inherent to his mandate, also through the assignment of specific tasks. The undersecretaries participate in the meetings of the Council, without the right to vote”.
What sparked the debate in the chamber above all was the issue of the costs of introducing the figure of undersecretaries: according to the tables contained in the report to the proposed law, the monthly allowance for an undersecretary is equal to over 14 thousand euros gross, the overall cost for undersecretaries is quantified as 347,280 euros when fully operational, and its coverage is provided with the resources already assigned to the Regional Council with the 2026-2028 budget forecast. According to the centre-left opposition, however, “the costs are much higher, quantifiable at one million euros per year because the costs for the support structures of the undersecretaries must also be included”. This thesis was however contested by the centre-right majority, who presented an amendment to reduce the latter cost by 600 thousand euros.
Speaking for the centre-left opposition were Enzo Bruno (Tridico President), Elisa Scutella, Elisabetta Barbuto (M5S), Giuseppe Ranuccio, Giuseppe Falcomatà, Rosellina Madeo, Ernesto Alecci (Pd), Filomena Greco (Reformist House).
For the centre-right majority Angelo Brutto (Brothers of Italy), Marco Polimeni (Forza Italia), Orlandino Greco (Lega), Giuseppe Mattiani (Lega), Riccardo Rosa (We Moderates).
The opposition contested “the uselessness of the introduction of a figure such as that of the undersecretaries which was already eliminated by the centre-right in 2012, and above all its inappropriateness, in light of the fact that the real priorities of Calabria and the Calabrians are different, and range from healthcare on its knees to growing poverty”. «Moreover – explained the regional councilors of the centre-left – it is not clear what these undersecretaries, who are neither councilors nor managers, will do: evidently they only serve to settle the internal balance of the majority and therefore respond to a pure power operation. Ultimately, it is a shameful law.”
For the centre-right, however, the «figure of undersecretaries responds to the need for greater effectiveness and efficiency of the political and administrative action of the Region and of the president, because Calabria is not as easy to govern as other regions, and then this figure has also been introduced in regions administered by the centre-left such as Emilia-Romagna and Tuscany». At the end of the debate the opposition left the chamber “because you are voting for this shameful law on your own”, and the text on undersecretaries was approved by the centre-right majority.