The Valencian Agency of Innovation (AVI) cannot find who controls it. The public law entity of the Generalitat for the improvement of the productive model in the Valencian Community has had to declare void the competition-opposition process for the definitive provision of an auditor job as none of the applicants passed the selective tests who applied to get the place. Although the AVI has, since 2018, a person who is assuming the supervisory functions of that position, the regulations require that all the positions of the workforce go to the definitive provision through an opposition. And one of the most important and necessary positions in a public body is that of the internal auditor.
Paradoxically, the AVI lacks this figure in a permanent position, whose functions, according to the decree law that regulates this position, are to verify the proper functioning of the budget execution systems and procedures, as well as the adequate balance between expenses and income, in addition to ensuring the accuracy and veracity of accounting data and extras, improving internal control and ensuring compliance with the organization’s plans and regulations. Precisely, the AVI received a barrage of criticism last summer from the governing bodies of Alicante universities, leading researchers and business organizations in the province after this newspaper revealed that 83% of the aid for innovation given by the organization were destined for Valencia and Castellón. And all despite the fact that the agency’s institutional headquarters are in Alicante, although it is actually directed from the capital of Túria.
The Official Gazette of the Generalitat publishes that the procedure to cover the permanent position of auditor, by general free shift and that corresponds to the 2019 public employment offer for the workforce of the Valencian Agency for Innovation, has been left deserted . There were three people who participated in the selection process, which consisted of two tests, plus the merit contest, and which had as a jury personnel from the Sindicatura de Comptes and the Intervention of the Generalitat, among others. Two of the applicants did not pass the first of the exams, on general legislation. The person who did go to the next phase did not get the minimum grade required in the second exam, specific to the position to be held in charge of the AVI audit.
Now the Valencian Innovation Agency will have to create a public job bank to be able to cover the place offered and have an internal auditor who can control its activity. The bases of this job offer indicate that those applicants to the competition-opposition who have passed the first of the exams can access it, so, initially, the position will be occupied by the person who got the minimum grade in the first of the tests. However, it will be temporary, for a certain time, until the AVI calls, again, another process for the definitive provision of the position of an internal auditor for the body created in 2017 and chaired by the head of the Consell, Ximo Puig, with Minister Carolina Pascual as Vice President and Andrés García Reche as Executive Vice President.
The strategic plan: 190 million for 1,200 initiatives
The new Strategic Subsidy Plan of the Valencian Innovation Agency (AVI) for the period 2022-2024 provides for the granting of 190 million euros in aid to promote more than 1,200 innovation actions and projects during its validity period, three years . This planning instrument contemplates a total of twelve subsidy lines with which to develop the strategic objectives of the AVI and aims to reinforce strategic collaboration projects and innovative public procurement. Through these stimuli, the agency intends to encourage the development of “innovative solutions” to challenges of “great depth” and economic and social relevance, through the collaboration of companies, universities, research centers and technological institutes of the Community. The effects of the plan will last, in fact, until 2026, given that the term to execute the aid in competitive competition is three years. The intention of the strategic plan, according to the executive vice president of the AVI, Andrés García Reche, is to promote projects that generate “a significant impact on the productive model of the Valencian Community.” In granting aid, the agency points out, projects aligned with the challenges and solutions previously identified by the agency’s Strategic Innovation Committee will be prioritized.
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Eddie is an Australian news reporter with over 9 years in the industry and has published on Forbes and tech crunch.