“Hello, today we still don’t have any (burial) license!! Is something wrong?” This ‘whatsapp’ was sent at 1:44 p.m. by the director of a funeral home to a lawyer from the Administration of Justice in charge of a civil registry from a town in the province of Barcelona. After a few minutes he insisted, alluding to the deceased pending burial: “They are for this afternoon. The official replied:” I am involved with a file, let’s see if I can sign in a moment.
The Sabadell registry has gone from serving 216,650 inhabitants to 322,417
He new management model of this service began to be implemented in 2021 in some cities and It is currently being deployed throughout the Barcelona province. The tasks previously carried out by various local registries, which were in charge of justices of the peacenow accumulate in a single office directed by a lawyer from the Administration of Justice. The risk of chaos is evident and there is a real possibility of delays in burials and registrations in generalsuch as marriages or new nationalities.
Civil registries in Spain processed between January 2 and June 22 of this year, 481,166 birth registrations, deaths, nationalities and marriage. Of this total, 72,466 correspond to Catalonia, the majority from the province of Barcelona, due to its population. The civil registries law that modified its operation and its structure dates back to 2011, but its deployment did not begin until 10 years later, in 2021. The forecast is to complete its application in September 2025, according to what the Ministry pointed out a few months ago. of Justice.
With outdated rules
“To date there is no new regulation, so the one from 1958 must be applied, already out of date. The application of an administrative law without the appropriate regulation is absolute nonsense from a legal point of view,” he says. Ivan Fruitfulresponsible for Sadadell Civil Registry. “At the organizational level, combine the work of a court and the civil registry can cause serious dysfunctions in the issuance of burial licenses and in the authorization of marriages. I myself have come to sign burial licenses at odd hours so as not to have to do it the next day and thus avoid families having to prolong the suffering and pain,” he recalls.
The objective of the Spanish Government was to reorganize these offices and provide them with the necessary means, including computers, to make this public service more efficient and agile. But there is also another motivation, no less important: his dejudicialization. The records were commanded by a judge and a lawyer from the Administration of Justice. With the new model, the latter official is solely responsible. The figure of the judge has disappeared from the organizational chart.
The lawyers of the Justice Administration of the registries, who do not charge for this work, denounce that they can’t cope due to the accumulation of cases and because, in addition, they combine this work with that of the court to which they are assigned. “The functions should be separated and the staff should be expanded,” says Frructuoso.
Concentration of functions
The saturation of the service is due to the fact that the new structure centralizes the procedures in the records of the towns that are the head of the judicial district, such as Sabadell, Terrassa, Rubí, Cerdanyola or Martorell (Barcelona is different and there are three civil registries). In Sabadell, for example, it has been from serving 216,650 inhabitants to 322,417, by incorporating nearby towns, such as Santa Perpètua de la Mogoda, Castellar del Vallès, Sant Quirze del Vallès and five others. In these municipalities, the offices are still open with a few officials to start the procedures that are concluded in Sabadell, where the lawyer from the Justice Administration is located.
In Terrassathe situation is similar, as the radius of action of its registry is extended to Matadepera or Viladecavalls, among others (from a population of 223,627 it has risen to 250,398). “The civil registry worked very well, with everyone’s effort, but the situation is absolute stress. Clearly a change was needed because the system was outdated, but as it’s being scaled up it’s a disaster,” he says. Julian Terrobathe person responsible for this record.
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the record of Cerdanyola will serve 180,586 people (before 57,855)by adding cities such as Ripollet, Montcada or Barberà del Vallès or Badía.
In case of Ruby It is also bloody, since in addition to the inhabitants of that town are added those of Sant Cugat del Vallès, which also has the General Hospital of Catalonia, and Castellbisbal del Vallès. Total: 184,107 inhabitants, when before Rubí covered the needs of 78,591 neighbors.