* Admissibility date reflects the date the case was officially registered. All other dates pertain to the date in which a stage was completed.
Case Description
Complaint
In April 2012 the Parents Association of C.P. Emilio Lluch Public School in Náquera, Valencia, Spain, lodged a complaint with the EIB Complaints Mechanism (EIB-CM). The complaint primarily referred to the appalling current state of the existing educational facilities. According to the complainant, the educational facilities have become substandard and inadequate since the construction of the school in 1980 due to a significant increase in the local school age population. All nursery classes and some primary classes at the school are housed in pre-fabricated classrooms affecting over 200 pupils, a half of all pupils in the school. In addition, eleven primary classes are taught in the obsolete and substandard existing educational facilities in the main building, which are overdue for renovation and modernisation. Moreover, the complainant questioned which schools were finally included in the Crea Escola programme and challenged the EIB lending operations Valencia Centros Escolares II-2 and III in relation with the monitoring of the loans and their financial aspects.
EIB-CM Action
After having reviewed the complaint and all the elements provided by the complainants, the EIB-CM held internal consultation meetings with the relevant EIB services. In July 2012, the EIB services conducted a monitoring mission to the Valencia region to assess any progress in the project implementation, realised investment costs to date and any planned investments until the project completion. In addition, they had engaged a specialist expert who assisted in the mission with the objective to provide a full report on the local situation. A debriefing meeting was held between the EIB-CM and the EIB services, where the mission’s preliminary findings and conclusions were discussed. Some of these findings and conclusions have been used by EIB-CM in the assessment of this complaint which is documented in EIB-CM's Conclusions Report.
Conclusions and Recommendations
The assessment carried out showed that the EIB did not commit an act of maladministration. However, the EIB-CM recommends that the EIB considers conducting a full and detailed assessment of the Valencia Centros Escolares projects in the near future.