The National Plan for Recovery and Resilience is “a valuable tool, which this government considers strategic and which it intends to use fully to carry out structural reforms, improve the competitiveness of the Italian system and accelerate innovation processes”. It is with these words that the Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, presents the Palazzo Chigi control room on the implementation of the Pnrr, for the preparation of the half-yearly report, while the controversies with the Court of Auditors occupy the table, which an amendment from the executive to Dl Pa excludes from control over the objectives of the Plan. However, the competent minister, Raffaele Fitto, explains that “there is no confrontation” with the judges of accounts, who will be received tomorrow for a meeting at Palazzo Chigi, but that the government complies with the law.
Fitto underlined this during a press conference convened after the control room, in which he highlighted that Italy “has the biggest plan at European level, with a total of 220 billion euros. This dimension also makes us understand the difference in approach in relation to to the plant. There is a lot of talk about the plots, only Italy, Spain and Greece asked for three plots and this is also useful in the general assessment. Changes in the plan are also another topic of debate: they represent an important phase of intervention and must be checked with the other countries, at this point only 5 countries have submitted the changes and so we are absolutely on time, there are no delays that I often hear about”.
Without delay, but time is needed to properly assess the changes that have become necessary due to the changed general conditions. “The Plan was born in a different historical period from the current one. The Russian Federation’s war of aggression against Ukraine, and the energy, economic and social shocks that followed, brought new priorities that must be taken into account and the consequent need to update the Flat”, emphasizes Meloni.
“The EU’s recommendations – explains Fitto – are similar to those of other countries, and for others they are much stricter. The Commission also recommends coordination between the Pnrr and cohesion policies, and the government has done this from the beginning. arrive at a single, organic vision”. A vision that allows modifying the Pnrr where it is necessary to modify it, keeping within the times, which are fundamental: “We are thinking about all the objectives of the next deadlines until June 2026, the alteration of an intermediate objective must be accompanied by the study of the impact on successive objectives. We are working to reduce the time required to introduce these changes. We need to do it very quickly, but not in a hurry, because if you do it quickly, you risk making mistakes.”
The minister also gives concrete examples: “One of the objectives until the 30th of June is to give work to the kindergartens and if the government changes the deadline, it does not do so not to finance the kindergartens, but to give time, with an intermediate goal, to finish the day care center work, exactly the opposite of what is usually said. The government has a deadline”.
On the front of the Court of Auditors, according to Fitto “resolution 17 of the Court establishes the responsibility of the manager for not having reached a goal of the fourth installment, but the verification of the achievement of a goal is not the competence of the Court of Auditors, and in addition it is necessary that the fourth installment be triggered: the objective of a plot that has not yet been triggered cannot be verified”.
In any case, “the resolution establishing the concurrent fiscal council refers to a law that predates the decision of the Pnrr, and does not refer to decree-law 77 of the Draghi government, which we are convinced must be applied” . In the morning, Deputy Prime Minister Antonio Tajani also spoke clearly on the subject: “Accounting judges must verify, it is not up to judges to make proposals. Judges judge, the judiciary must exercise judicial power, not political power”.
Source: IL Tempo
Emma Fitzgerald is an accomplished political journalist and author at The Nation View. With a background in political science and international relations, she has a deep understanding of the political landscape and the forces that shape it.
