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La cooperación entre el Estado y las regiones, eje del mensaje de Meloni al Festival de las Regiones · Imagen generada — Erick Prometeo Media

Meloni defends State and region cooperation at the Festival of Regions

Meloni closed the Festival of Regions by defending cooperation between the State and the territories, presenting an assessment that credits Italy with leading…

--- The context --- President of the Council of Ministers Giorgia Meloni sent a video message as the fifth edition of the Festival of Regions and Autonomous Provinces drew to a close, greeting President Fedriga and local administrators. She argued that the Constitution upholds regional autonomy and that most issues affecting citizens require full cooperation between all levels of Government, which she described not as a formality but as a concrete need. --- The facts --- According to the assessment Meloni herself presented, the revision and implementation of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan established Italy as the number one ranked nation in Europe in financial progress and in the number of objectives reached. In healthcare, she credited that shared effort with around 1,600 new facilities, including community care centres and community hospitals, more than 3,100 pieces of major, cutting-edge equipment such as mammography equipment, CT scanners and MRI machines, and 6,000 new beds on intensive and semi-intensive care wards, with electronic health records at unprecedented levels of use. Meloni added that measures were developed alongside the plan to cut waiting lists, including the national monitoring platform and the integration of booking systems. In the first nine months of 2026, she said, approximately two million more services were provided than in the same period last year, and compliance with guaranteed waiting times also improved. On cohesion policy, she said the reformed Cohesion Agreements had activated investments worth approximately EUR 60 billion for infrastructure, works and strategic projects that local areas need and proposed, jointly agreed with the State. --- The positions --- Meloni's position is that these milestones teach a simple yet crucial lesson: when the State and regional authorities share objectives and responsibilities, resources become opportunities and investments genuinely improve the lives of citizens and businesses. She presented cooperation between levels of government as the basis for building a stronger, more united and more cohesive nation, thanked them for their work and cooperation, and closed by looking ahead to the next Festival. --- What remains unknown --- The message offers no independent verification of the figures it presents: it is the Government's own assessment, delivered by its head, without external checking. It also does not detail how the new health facilities are distributed among regions, nor what deadlines remain for completing the reduction of waiting lists, a path Meloni herself described as still long. --- Unanswered questions --- Will independent review confirm that Italy remains first in Europe on financial progress and objectives under the plan? How are the 1,600 new facilities and the 6,000 new beds distributed across the regions? Can the improvement of two million additional services and better guaranteed waiting times be sustained in the coming months? --- EPM analysis --- Read through territorial cohesion, the speech centres on the public services citizens touch: community care, diagnostic equipment and shorter waits. Its wager is that cooperation between the State and the regions is what turns European investment into real care in each territory, rather than a bureaucratic division of funds. 📌 EPM Take: In EPM's view, the message matters because of what it prioritises: the prime minister makes healthcare and territorial cohesion the public test of her model of cooperation between the State and the regions, and she does so with concrete figures that can be checked territory by territory. If facilities, equipment and waiting times improve where people actually live, regional autonomy gains practical meaning; if they do not, this assessment will remain one more closing speech, however solemn it sounded at an institutional festival.
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