The law updates the port policy of the Generalitat to respond to the new challenges of the sector

The Generalitat has approved the draft law on ports and transport in marine and continental waters, "a large and large law that wants to give complete response to the regulation of the Catalan port system in all its scope," as explained by the Councillor of Territory and Sustainability during the post-Executive Council press conference. The law updates the port policy of the Generalitat to respond to the new challenges of the sector and to strengthen the conception of the port facilities as economic operators and service lenders, in short, with the new regulation "is moved from a nautical law to a port law with all the consequences."

The advisor Rull has stressed that this is a law "designed with a state mentality, for all the ports of Catalonia, not only for the 45 ports that today are owned by the Generalitat, but also for the two ports of general interest," the Port of Barcelona and the Port of Tarragona. In this sense he has said that the law is prepared to incorporate these ports into a "individualized" management model, is a law applicable to the entire Catalan harbour system and therefore is a broad law "designed to be operational in autonomy and to be operational in the stage of a state of its own." This bill has as one of its main objectives to put the port infrastructure at the service of the economic industrial, logistics, sports, fishing, tourism and social promotion of the country, both from the public and private side.

The growth of the sports nautical as a dynamic and strategic element; the modernization of the fisheries sector; the increase of the commercial and industrial port traffic; the adaptation of the Catalan ports to the requirements of the new ships of great length and the transit of cruises; the widespread increase of the economic activity linked to the sector and the presence of the private initiative are the main factors that have caused the impulse of the new regulations. The approved bill establishes a new port administrative organization, so that the Department of Territory and Sustainability will be responsible for planning and management, and the public company Ports of the Generalitat will manage (directly or indirectly through concession companies) all ports of the system.

The new regulation aims to promote the growth of operators and users who develop value-generating activities through efficient port services. It thus regulates the administrative and management organisation at the service of the operators of the sector, with particular attention to transparency and administrative simplification in the relationship between these operators and the port administration. In order to generate more economic activity and to make new investments in port infrastructure and services, the draft law establishes a contractual legal regime that aims to promote public-private collaboration (concessions for the construction of public port works and concessions for port management). The draft Act aims to promote associated nautical, recreational, sports and cultural activities and, as a novelty, provides for the identification of sports ports by category, in accordance with the quality of their facilities and the services they offer. The system, which will be developed with a specific regulation, is similar to that of the stars for the hotel establishments, in order to encourage the actions that make it possible to gain in quality and to serve as a reference guide to the users of the facilities.