Mutriku Natur Taldea states that the project carried out by the Basque Government to extend the protection dam of Mutriku to 440 metres violates urban and environmental regulations. And in the face of this legal breach, the environmental platform asked the committee to review the legality of this project in the European Parliament. The European Parliament will now accept the request and examine the legality of the project.

Considering that the award of the contract for the execution of the works infringed “voluntarily” the environmental legislation, Mutriku Natur Taldea submitted in October last year an administrative appeal to the High Court of Justice of the Basque Country against the award of the contract for improving maritime access to the port of Mutriku by the Department of Development, Sustainability and the Environment of the Basque Government. At the same time, it asked the European Union to comply with the guarantees contained in the European directives on construction works.

“European legislation obliges each Member State to comply with the Environmental Impact Assessment Regulation (EIA). Therefore, it should be noted that the project for the expansion of the dam developed by the government in 2019 meets the criteria of the directive, but that has not been done,” explained the members of the Mutriku Natur Group. In this sense, they recall that with the construction of the dam in 2005 Mutriku lost an important part of the natural heritage.

The members of the ecologist platform considered that the impact assessment of the projects under the Mutriku Port Special Plan 2001 has not been taken into account either. “The Department of the Environment of the Basque Government issued on 29 July 2004 a resolution in favour of the Environmental Impact Declaration of the Maritime Access Improvement Project to the Port of Mutriku. This clearly states that the extension of the port of Mutriku cannot be carried out without the implementation of all phases of the EIA procedure. Thus, the work of prolonging the dam does not correspond to the project carried out in 2001.”

The Naturalistic Group therefore considers that the Special Plan for the New Port is not being complied with. Because, according to this, the EIA had to refer to the plan as a whole. “Deliberate non-compliance with existing urban and environmental legislation is evident.”

Technical reports. It is suggested that there are technical reports demonstrating that the length of the current dam is sufficient to ensure compliance with the dyke production objective. “Everything else has no justification. Furthermore, the works condition the policies of protection and conservation of the coast and the objectives of the sustainable management of the natural resources that are part of it. This contradicts the proposals in the EU’s Integrated Coastal Zone Management and the Spanish Biodiversity Conservation Strategy.”

In general, the members of the environmental platform say they have “very clear” that the government’s objective is not safety, “but to build another marina sheltered from the long dam.” The members of the Mutriku Natur Group are pleased that the European Commission accepts the request, but remember that the work is underway. “They tried to put the project into European Next funds to get it out for free, but they didn’t. All processing has been carried out by citizens without being published in the Official Gazette of the Basque Country. However, they do not refuse and have the works in progress. We are not willing to give in and at least we will fight to comply with the law.”

Attitude of the Port Authority to requests for information

Mutriku Natur Taldea reports that in September 2021 a request for information was made to the Port Directorate of the Basque Government. “The Administration has a period of one month to reply, and in the absence of a few hours to finish, we were informed that they took the extension of the other month to reply.”

Well, in the absence of a few hours to end the second month, the Ports Directorate was informed that they were not answered because the matter was in court. “This latest communication was sent to us unsigned, but it highlights the scope of the Directorate of Ports’ code of ethics and the degree of compliance with the Aarhus Convention on the handling of requests for information.”

Thus, they have pointed out that “Mutriku Natur Taldea has been monitoring this reduction for more than twenty years, and as we know what to explore, if it is not by the judge’s hand we will receive documents to prove a misuse of public money”.

Because they say that the law determines that you can't pay twice the same work. “There are only two options: firstly, unawarded works were paid or works identical to those previously awarded.”