Óscar Puente, Minister of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, confirmed this Tuesday the appointment of José Antonio Santano as the new Secretary of State for Transport. Pointing it out as the first step in a series of changes that will be applied in the near future with the aim of improving the functioning of the ministry.
Puente has also begun to specify part of the changes that it will announce in the coming days that will involve impact reforms in the functioning of the ministry. The previous division between a General Secretariat for Infrastructure and another for Transport will be eliminated, unifying their powers to make way for a General Secretariat for Land Transport, which will house everything that has to do with transportation and infrastructure in this area. , to which a maritime and an air secretariat will be added, he noted.
In this way, an attempt will be made to give greater meaning and better functionality to the ministry’s apparatus, a change that “is not an idea nor is its paternity entirely mine, but is something that has also been proposed in this house for some time. and I think it is a good idea and we will soon implement that change with the corresponding changes in the structure,” he detailed.
On the other hand, he highlighted that a fundamental leg of this ministry is public-private collaboration and that, “without companies, we will not be able to develop the workforce that we want to do in this ministry.”
“Without companies, we will not be able to develop the workforce that we want to do in this ministry”
José Antonio Santano until now mayor and Irún
He has also referred to the reasons that led him to choose Santano, mayor of Irún, for the position of Secretary of State for Transport, and explained that, when he met him, from a political point of view “it was love at first sight “. , full harmony.” Likewise, he has said that he is going to try to transfer the deformation of being mayor to the ministry because “the mayor is by definition finicky and, therefore, even if he delegates and forms teams, he will always keep an eye on the management” qualities and characteristics that Santano has.
He has described him as a mayor “committed to his land and dedicated to a way of understanding politics that is exactly the same as mine and is what I am going to try to transfer to this ministry.”
High speed connection with the north
On the other hand, the new Secretary of State has made special mention of the train to the north of Spain because it is “a challenge we have, I am Basque and I believe that this country needs to close the high-speed connection to the north.” .
Santano has clarified that it is not a connection only with the Basque Country and Irun as a station, but that it is the European connection of the Atlantic Axis and “I want to say today that, for me, that is also an axis that must be paid attention to because I think we have a lot at stake there.”
Change also in the presidency of Adif
As an addition, at the event and despite it not being official yet, the guests congratulated Ángel Contreras, who if nothing changes will be the new president of Adif. Contreras is a Civil, Canal and Port engineer from the Polytechnic University of Valencia. In the private sector, he spent between 2000 and 2006 in engineering, later moving to Ineco and in 2011 to Adif. His last position was general director of Conservation and Maintenance in this last public company.
