The government placed its trust in the text of the economic package in the Chamber. The vote is scheduled for tonight, which will be followed by the agendas and motions. Most are aiming for another night marathon to reach the final tomorrow morning, December 24th, the day before Christmas. Then it will be the turn of the Senate, where the game will close much faster, between the 27th and 28th, to avoid the specter of the provisional exercise. Tight deadlines continue to dictate the agenda for this budget session.
After a new day punctuated by countless stops at the court, the return to the Commission, lively disputes between the majority and the opposition, yesterday afternoon the Budget Commission of Montecitorio gave its agreement to the changes requested by the State Court of Auditors. The technicians raised 44 observations about some measures due to lack of adequate financial coverage. In addition, an amendment was withdrawn, erroneously approved in recent days, which allocated funds to municipalities that have to repay their deficit, as it created a negative budget balance of 450 million.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said she was satisfied with the budget law “in the midst of a thousand difficulties, even running, with complex days and despite everything that can and should be improved”. Arguing further that “compared to those who expected and foreshadowed the departure of this majority and this government as a catastrophe, the whole story that is told about us is coming back to them like a boomerang”. Criticize the opposition. The secretary of the Pd, Enrico Letta, insists: “What happened in these hours in Parliament is the demonstration that the government and the majority were not prepared. The budget law is the worst done in the last twenty years».
While M5S leader Giuseppe Conte speaks of “mistakes after mistakes” in a “goose game in which, instead of moving forward, you always return to the starting point, playing in the shoes of the citizens”. Former Prime Minister and senator for life Mario Monti comments: “I was positively surprised by the compliance with European guidelines and the prudence with the public budget and for that reason I would give an 8 or even a 9. great inattention to the issue of inequalities, which, at most, are reinforced».
Among the reformulations requested by the Accounts Office, one concerns the two Cultura Cards that will replace App18. The text approved by the commission specified that the two cards would be financed at a maximum limit of 190 million euros annually from 2024, remaining in 2023 with the resources already committed for 2022.
The note sent by MEF technicians to the Chamber, however, highlighted that to cover 2023 it is necessary for the Ministry to adopt decrees to “make the necessary budgetary changes”. “We solved everything”, explained FdI deputy Federico Mollicone after the changes in the Commission, the first signatory of the text. It was also agreed that the members of the board who will be called upon to take care of refreshments for merchants in electronic payments, to try to numb the cost of bank commissions for transactions of up to 30 euros, will not be compensated.
Precisely at the Pos, Meloni expressed himself: «I am sure that it is not correct to impose on merchants, who have to bear the cost of bank commissions, to accept payments for very low amounts. Would anyone who wants to pay for coffee with an ATM pay even so if the cost of commissions were charged to the coffee?” even if it is not “fair”: “If you refuse to work with a decent job and with all the guarantees of the case because that is not the job of your dreams, you cannot expect the State to pay you the basic income, because it is a question of justice”.
Source: IL Tempo
Roy Brown is a renowned economist and author at The Nation View. He has a deep understanding of the global economy and its intricacies. He writes about a wide range of economic topics, including monetary policy, fiscal policy, international trade, and labor markets.
