Proposal was on President Lula’s priority list; Text also changes the public-private partnerships
The House of Representatives approved this Wednesday (7.MAI.2025) the bill that changes the regime of public-private concessions and partnerships. The text was approved with symbolic vote, in which there is no individual registration of the votes. Only PSOL voted against.
The proposal was on the president’s (PT) priority list. The government even did not interfere with the vote prior to that of the project, which approved the appeal to suspend the process against (PL-RJ) in the Supreme Court (STF).
In February, the Finance Minister, who was in dealing with Congress to improve concessions and PPPs legislation in 2025. He said the intention was to approve “At least in the House” Still in the 1st semester.
“I consider the legal framework of concessions and PPPs in Brazil quite satisfactory, but over the last 20 years a lot has changed. There have been questions that have been judicialized, some insecurity. There are small gaps that we can improve to give more guarantee to both the public manager and the entrepreneur to participate in the bids.”said Haddad at an event of B3 (São Paulo Stock Exchange) on February 2.
The federal deputy (Citizenship-SP) presented on April 25 the project. The text proposes significant changes in various parts of current legislation. According to the congressman, the goal is to increase legal certainty, attract investments and give greater agility to the execution of projects.
TCU
One of the highlights is the establishment of up to 120 days for the Federal Court of Audit (TCU) to conclude the analysis of concession projects sent by granting bodies or regulatory agencies.
If the court requests additional information, the deadline is suspended until the documentation is sent.
The measure seeks to avoid excessive delays by the control organ, especially in sensitive steps such as the publication of the edicts.
Automatic readjustment
The report also allows tariff adjustments based on index or formulas provided for in contract to be applied automatically by the concessionaires if the granting authority does not approve the new values within 30 days.
The initiative responds to investor criticism of slowness and sometimes political interference in updating tariffs, especially in contracts signed with states and municipalities.
Environmental license
Another relevant point is the revocation of the provision of the Environmental Crimes Law (Law 9,605 of 1998) which determined prison sentence for civil servants who issued environmental licenses outside legal parameters. The proposal is supported by the infrastructure sector, which sees in the rule a factor of inhibition for the performance of environmental technicians and analysts.
Other changes
In addition, the text suggests:
- Permission for multimodal contracts, which gather projects from different sectors, such as highways and ports, under the same concession;
- judgment criteria that consider the best technique or shorter period of execution of the service;
- Objective rules for contract rebalancing, with punishments for requests made in bad faith;
- Simplified procedures for the transfer of concession control;
- Authorization for hiring independent checks that support regulatory agencies in project monitoring;
- Creation of tripartite agreements between granting power, concessionaire and financiers, with the objective of ensuring contractual continuity in the event of corporate changes;
- Guidelines for the intervention of the public power in concessions, including removal of the board and up to 60 days to present a recovery plan;
- Use of public funds resources such as guarantees or counterattacks in PPP contracts.
