The Spanish automotive industry has been sounding the alarm bells for years. Spain, traditionally the second largest car manufacturer in Europe and one of the world’s major production centers, has just lost its position to Brazil.
This drop is part of a deeper crisis affecting the entire continent. Since the pandemic, Europe has gone from selling 19 million vehicles a year to just 15 million, a slump that has had a direct impact on Spanish factories: the country has stopped producing two million units, equivalent, as the industry stresses, to the 16 Spanish plants being shut down for a whole year.
Faced with this panorama, the industry agrees for the first time in decades on a common diagnosis: if more cars are not sold in Spain, the automotive plants located in our territory will not be able to maintain their production volume. This consensus has led employers, social agents, electricity companies, autonomous communities and the Ministry of Industry, led by Jordi Hereu, to promote a major rescue plan: the Auto 2030 Plan.
A united industry and a clear message: either Spain sells more cars or loses its industry
The sector, led by Anfac, has finally achieved what seemed impossible: a common front. After months of meetings, they have synthesized their message in a very simple idea: the domestic market must be reactivated if Spain wants to keep its strategic role in the European automotive industry.
The Auto 2030 Plan is the tool proposed to achieve this. It is a program with a transversal scope, which will cover both factories and buyers, and seeks to correct the errors of the current aid system, especially Moves, which is considered insufficient and poorly managed.
Although the final details have not yet been made public, the outlines are quite clear.
Direct aid and no personal income tax: the big change in the Auto 2030 Plan
The key defining element of the Auto 2030 Plan will be direct aid to the buyer. The industry is calling for subsidy:
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It is discounted at the time of purchase, at the dealership.
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Do not compute in the IRPF, avoiding that it affects the annual declaration.
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Do not depend on slow or insufficient regional calls, as is currently the case.
In the absence of specifics, all indications are that the aid will be similar to that of Moves: between 4,000 and 7,000 euros, depending on the type of vehicle and whether an old car is delivered. The plan would be aimed mainly at:
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100% electric cars
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Plug-in hybrids
Although it is not ruled out that, in the final stretch of negotiations, non-plug-in hybrids will also be included, but with lower amounts.
The Auto 2030 Plan is also committed to a centralized management of the funds, to avoid the problems that currently generate differences between communities. There are autonomous regions that have not even activated Moves yet, while others exhausted the funds months ago, leaving thousands of buyers in limbo.
The failure of Moves as a precedent: delays, inequalities and subsidies that do not arrive
An important part of the diagnosis of the sector focuses on Moves errors:
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Subsidies that take up to two years to be collected.
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Autonomous communities without funds, leaving buyers with approved aid but without receiving a euro.
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Cumbersome processes, difficult to process and without homogeneity throughout the State.
The sector is asking to prevent this situation from “falling into oblivion”, as the delays have caused enormous distrust among consumers. There are thousands of buyers who have been approved for the aid, but there is no guarantee that the budget line necessary to pay them will arrive.
This scenario, they warn, is paralyzing the renewal of the car fleet, one of the oldest in Europe.
A plan inspired by the Valencian success story
The design of the Auto 2030 Plan takes as a reference the Reinicia Auto Plan, an initiative promoted in the Valencian Community after the DANA, which did manage to boost vehicle sales and was based on three key elements:
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Direct billing support.
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Agile management.
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Immediate impact on the buyer’s pocket.
According to the industry, replicating this model on a national scale would accelerate the transition to electrified vehicles and, at the same time, preserve the production capacity of Spanish factories, which are highly dependent on domestic consumption for new production models.
A decisive industrial and economic challenge for Spain
The automotive sector involves:
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10% of Spanish GDP
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More than 2 million indirect jobs
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Hundreds of thousands of direct jobs in factories, dealerships and logistics
It is, therefore, a strategic sector whose decline would have a serious impact on the national economy.
Manufacturers recall a key phrase in their diagnosis: “If Spain does not sell more cars, Spain will not manufacture more cars”. The Auto 2030 Plan is seen as the only way to avoid this drift.
7,000 euros per car? What the buyer can expect
If negotiations proceed as the industry expects, the buyer could find itself with:
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Between 4,000 and 7,000 euros direct discount on the purchase of an electrified car.
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A homogeneous system throughout the country.
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Immediate payment, without subsequent formalities or dependence on IRPF.
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Possibility of including non-plug-in hybrids.
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Legal certainty: aid guaranteed from the start.
While waiting for the government to unveil the fine print, the sector is confident that the Auto 2030 Plan will be the movement capable of changing the trend in the Spanish automotive market.
