After years of strict application of budgetary discipline by the European institutions and very important cuts in public spending by national and regional authorities, the sustainability and guarantee of provision of essential public services, under the terms in which they have been doing so far, including the reforms of recent years, are seriously questioned. The main objective of this project is to contribute to the analysis of the financing system of public services, based on the results obtained in the study carried out in two previous research projects on the financial legal impact of the measures adopted within the framework of budgetary discipline. to reduce the deficit, first, in general and, later, in a paradigmatic sector such as health, and which covers both the spending and income aspects.

The project is proposed by introducing in the analysis the general perspective about the delimitation of public services and their financing mechanisms at the different territorial levels of government. From this perspective, it addresses the regional financing system, the distribution of powers and the various forms of management of public services and their financial legal impact, both in terms of budgetary stability and financial sustainability and in terms of their budgetary effects (control of public spending, transparency and equitable allocation of resources). Finally, it is projected on certain specific sectors: health services, and water supply and electricity services, due to the controversy that the financing of these services currently raises.

This research is key in the current situation, marked by several elements. Basically, the imminent reform of the regional and local financing system, the risk of stagnation in economic growth warned by the European institutions, aware of the consequences of a strict application of budgetary discipline, and the crisis of certain forms of provision and financing of public services, as is the case of public-private partnerships.

In this context, it is necessary to analyze the financing of public services and their sources, and to explore the introduction of measures that, without prejudice to compliance with the EU's budgetary stability mandates, allow an increase in investment in order to achieve a modern and effective public administration, not only from the point of view of economic efficiency, but also of legal guarantees for citizens.

The research will be led from the field of Financial and Tax Law, but it is proposed with an interdisciplinary nature, with the participation of researchers and professionals, both Spanish and foreign, from Public Economy and Fiscal Federalism, Health Economy, Medicine and Management of public services (health and basic supplies). With this composition of the research team and the work team, a greater knowledge of the reality on which it is working is intended and to facilitate the contrast of legal-formal solutions with said reality, a methodology that has already been used successfully in recent years.