The Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency presents to les Corts its Activity Report for the 2020 year

Current Information, Press release

More than 800 people receive training from the Valencia Antifraud Agency in matters of ethics and public integrity and the fight against corruption during 2020

València, March 30, 2021.- The Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency has presented its Activity Report for the year 2020 to the Les Corts Board, thus fulfilling the mandate contained in article 22 of Law 11/2016 for the creation of the agency.
The award ceremony took place in the Pati de Les Corts and the President of Les Corts, Enric Morera, as well as the members of the Les Corts Board were present.
On this occasion, the Activity Report has been delivered in digital form through a pen as well as a QR code from which the document can be easily downloaded. In this way, the AVAF contributes to the reduction of paper consumption and economic spending by adhering to the 2030 sustainability commitments
The Report includes the activity carried out by the Agency in 2020 in the area of ​​training, prevention and documentation; the legal and protection area of ​​the complainant; analysis and research; administration, recruitment and human resources and communication.
After the ceremony of delivery of the Report, the director of the AVAF, Joan Llinares has attended to the media and has highlighted some of the most important points developed by the Agency during a year 2020 that despite being marked by the COVID crisis -19 has been more intense and has registered greater activity for this body since it began its operation at the end of 2020.
Thus, in the area of ​​training, the Agency has offered training to more than 800 people in all the activities it has organized and in which it has collaborated, emphasizing one of the main functions entrusted to the Agency for the prevention of fraud and corruption and creating a culture based on ethics and public integrity.
Regarding the complaints received during the year 2020, they reached the figure of 226 and 85% of them were presented through the Complaints Mailbox, which has become the main channel for informing the Agency of acts and events that can be constitutive of fraud and corruption in the Valencian public administrations.
Regarding the subject matter of the complaints filed, in 32% of the cases they are in public procurement, which represents a significant increase compared to 2019, where these complaints represented 25%. 64% of the most reported public administrations were local and 51% of them are in the province of Valencia.
With regard to the protection of people who report corruption, the AVAF received 35 requests and 24 people have been granted the status of protected person, which places the Valencian Community as a benchmark when anticipating the transposition into the Spanish legal system of the European Directive 1937 / 2019 of whistleblowers, informants or whistleblowers of corruption better known as the Whistleblowers Directive.
The Director of the Agency, Joan Llinares, has stated that “this Activity Report includes all the work carried out by AVAF staff in their different areas during 2020 and is a reflection that despite the difficulties arising from the pandemic situation have not been an obstacle to carry out their functions of investigation, prevention, training and protection of the whistleblowers ”.
“I encourage you to consult the Report, a document of more than 200 pages in which the work developed over these 12 months appears and which is the confirmation of the consolidation of the Agency as a body in the fight against fraud and corruption both nationally and internationally. And as an example of this international recognition is that for the first time, the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) under the European Commission has requested the collaboration of the Agency for an operation against fraud and corruption developed in the Valencian Community ” added Llinares.

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Executive Summary of the 2020 report

126 people participate in the conference on unjust enrichment organized by Cosital Valencia and the Anti-Fraud Agency

Courses, Press release

Valencia. March 25, 2021. In order to share reflections and proposals for the necessary measures to redirect the path of unjust enrichment to its exceptionality, the Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency in collaboration with COSITAL Valencia have organized a conference-debate.

Under the webinar format, the session had speakers belonging to both external control bodies: Antonio Mira-Perceval Pastor, Síndic of the Comptes Sindicatura de la Generalitat Valenciana and Carlos Cubillo Rodríguez, Technical Director of the First Department of the Prosecution Section of the Court of Accounts; as an intern: Teresa Moreo Marroig, Delegate Comptroller of the Autonomous Community of the Balearic Islands and Jorge García Hernández, General Comptroller of the Gandía City Council and from the consultative sphere: Patricia Boix Mañó, Senior Legal Counsel of the Valencian Community Legal Council.

The day began with a presentation by Vanesa Felip, president of Cosital Valencia and member of the participation council of the Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency, who thanked the participants for their involvement in a session that brought together 126 attendees from both the online platform and from the AVAF YouTube channel.

The interventions and the subsequent debate, moderated by Irene Bravo Rey, head of the AVAF Prevention Service, made it possible to present different points of view tending to the common objective of minimizing irregularities derived from abusive and recurrent practices of unjust enrichment and their economic treatment Through the exceptional figure of extrajudicial recognition of credits (REC, in the case of local entities), the following can be drawn as the main joint conclusions:

1st) The sector of activity in the public sector where this figure is used most frequently is contracting.

2nd) The main causes of its abuse are the lack of budgetary discipline, standardized administrative procedures and planning.

3rd) In general, the abuse of the path of unjust enrichment would be stopped by applying the principles of good administration and, especially, that of legality. Thus, the procedures provided for in the respective sectoral regulations must be applied both to carry out the order of the provision and to compensate who has executed it (in the case of contracting, the provisions of article 42 of the Law of Public Sector Contracts) .

4th) Other adequate prevention mechanisms to stop irregular practices go through the adequate planning of recruitment, aligned with budgets, as well as the sufficiency, adaptation and training of human resources of intervention services, legal and recruitment managers, without prejudice to raising awareness of the situation throughout the organization, and implementing complaint boxes.

5th) For those exceptional cases in which the REC must be resorted to due to unjust enrichment, a clear legal regulation of its procedure should be articulated, in line with the recommendations of the Audit Reports of the RECs of Local Entities, 2018, made by the Court of Accounts and the Sindicatura de Comptes, as well as in the general recommendation of the AVAF. In this sense, the Balearic Islands have specific regulations.

6th) It would be convenient to reflect on the scope of article 28.2e) of RD 424/2017 on Internal Control, for legal certainty and accommodation to the functions of the intervention.

7th) Mechanisms should be articulated that allow to settle possible responsibilities of the authorities, personnel at the service of the Public Administrations and public and private companies that accept and carry out the orders outside the law. Regarding the former, accounting responsibility stands out, compatible with disciplinary, administrative, transparency and criminal legislation. Always bearing in mind the difficulties of management, especially in municipalities with few resources.

The director of the AVAF, Joan Llinares, closed the day by thanking the participants for their contributions and emphasizing the importance of abiding by the principle of legality and the general principles of contracting to close the door to arbitrariness and, with it, the affectation of fundamental rights such as equality. “This type of conference should serve to avoid the normalization of this practice in our administrations. Speaking publicly about these contracting anomalies is the first step to solve this problem ”, Llinares highlighted in his conclusion.

Finally, it should be noted that one of the functions of the Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency (AVAF) is to prevent fraud and corruption and, for this reason, by Resolution of the Director no. 122/2020, of May 11, approved its general recommendation: “The path of unjust enrichment in the public sector: use or abuse?”, Noting how the use of unjust enrichment, is by nature exceptional, has become a common practice in our public administrations, being an important source of risk of fraud and corruption.

You can access the complete sesssion in this link

The Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency proposes to grant the status of protected witness to persons complaining of corruption in the Draft Law on Criminal Procedure

Press release

Valencia, March 11, 2021.- The Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency has presented a set of allegations in the hearing and public information process opened by the Ministry of Justice in the process of preparing the Draft Law on Criminal Procedure.
The amendments presented by the AVAF are aimed at the new Criminal Procedure Law taking into account the scope of the work that is being carried out with the necessary transposition into the Spanish legal system of the European Directive 2019/1937 on the protection of people who report violations of Union law better known as the whistleblowers directive.
Specifically, it is proposed that the validity of the anonymous complaint be included in the criminal procedure as an instrument to facilitate the knowledge of acts constituting fraud and corruption that may occur in the public sector, as it is clear from the experience of the Agency through its Complaints Box.
Another of the amendments refers to the expansion of the complaint channels from the internal channels that are proposed in the Draft Law, to the inclusion of the external complaint channels as established in the European Directive with the aim of adapting it. to the same.
With regard to the protection of whistleblowers and alerters of facts constituting fraud and corruption crimes, the Valencian Antifraud Agency proposes an extension of the assumptions included in the Draft Law so that not only those cases that pose a risk to “the life, integrity or freedom” of the reporting and alerting persons, but also the cases in which the retaliation as a consequence of having denounced or testified implies an attack on the professional or labor rights, economic or of any other kind.
Linked to the foregoing, it is also proposed that the possibility of granting the status of protected witness be included in those cases in which there is dependence or vulnerability within the work context with respect to the investigated persons or their environment, since it is precisely in this area in which reprisals take place as a result of the complaints filed.
Another of the proposals that is made is the extension of the figure of the repentant in the criminal organization field, as reflected in the current text of the Draft Bill, to cases of corruption and fraud, since in these it is difficult to occasions that the existence of a criminal organization for the commission of crimes can be demonstrated. The inclusion of the figure of the repentant would contribute to the prosecution of fraud and corruption in the public sector with information that is key so that crimes are uncovered and accountability is demanded.
Lastly, the Valencian Anti-Fraud Agency proposes the creation of a statute of protection for the complainant or whistleblower of corruption comparable to the statute of victim. This statute would establish protection measures for the complainant and whistleblower of corruption such as the concealment of their personal data in order to guarantee the confidentiality and protection of the identity of these people, especially during the criminal investigation phase.

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Amendments presented in the process of preparing the Draft Law on Criminal Procedure