Reports of irregularities in NRRP - State Audit Court

(ANSA) - ROME, FEB 13 - There have been several reports of irregularities in the implementation of Italy's massive EU-funded post-Covid national recovery and resilience plan (NRRP), the general prosecutor of the State Audit Court Pio Silvestri said on Tuesday.
    "The preparation of the contextual rules having been completed, the implementation of the NRRP is now in full swing and there are already several reports of irregularities," said Silvestri in his report for the inauguration of the judicial year.
    The general prosecutor highlighted in particular reports of "undue receipt or incorrect use of funds by the implementing bodies, irregularities in the receipt of contributions sub specie for works that do not conform to plans or show very significant delays in their implementation".
    Italy's revised NRRP to make the economy greener, more modern and less dependant on Russian fossil fuels is now worth a total of 194.4 billion euro, of which 122.6 billion euro in loans and 71.8 billion euro in grants.
    The new NRRP, signed off by the European Council last December, covers 66 reforms - seven more than the original plan - and 150 investments that must be completed by the deadline of 2026.
    However, Silvestri said "modest progress has been made in the utilisation of the large amount of resources made available, despite the fact that a sufficiently advanced stage has been reached in their allocation to the implementing bodies, amounting to approximately 142 billion euro, i.e. more than 70% of the NRRP resources".
    "According to the most recent data gathered by the Parliamentary Budget Office, based on the information contained in the ReGIS platform, as of November 26, 2023, 28.1 billion euro had been spent, while 138.2 billion euro remain to be spent to achieve all the planned targets," he added. (ANSA).