Stability Pact: goodbye to expenses. Gentiloni-Misiani clash in the Democratic Party
“Government accounts locked in a cage.” Repubblica gives this definition by analyzing the agreement on the Stability Pact, with “the spending promises and miraculous hopes, a memory of the past. Now that the definitive agreement on the new Stability Pact has been closed, the belt-tightening season.Because the new rules, beyond the confirmation of the parameters, present a certainty for Italy: every move must first be examined and approved by the Commission. And the path to returning from the deficit and debt will begin very soon: next June 21st.”
In short, Repubblica continues, “the summer of 2024 will be politically and economically overheated for Palazzo Chigi. And this despite the fact that the latest text has received some softening: a little more flexibility on adjustment times, discount on debt interest until 2027, investment incentives also in relation to co-financing. But these are limited improvements and certainly do not change the final result.”
As La Stampa explains, there is also trouble in the opposition. Paolo Gentiloni from Brussels calls the agreement “good news”. But in Rome the Democratic Party thinks differently. “The agreement on the new stability pact has implemented some important improvement proposals put forward by the European Parliament, which strengthen the role of the social pillar in the EU semester and exclude national co-financing from net spending, increasing the space for investments. In the final text, however, the safeguard clauses on deficit and debt introduced by the agreement between the governments are confirmed and a permanent European instrument to finance the common goods and investments necessary for the ecological and digital transition continues to be missing. The new pact does not restore the unrealistic previous rules. However, overall, it largely represents a missed opportunity, because it outlines a more complicated and rigid framework of rules than the Commission's proposal and far below what Europe would need to relaunch inclusive and sustainable development and effectively address the great challenges we face.” Antonio Misiani, head of Economy, Finance, Business and Infrastructure in the PD national secretariat, wrote this in a note.
M5s: “Agreement on the Stability Pact is terrible for Italy”
“The agreement reached by the two European co-legislators on the reform of the Stability Pact is very bad for Italy. The new basic parameters, namely a 1% reduction in the debt and a 1.5% reduction in the deficit for countries that have deficits above 3%, which are the majority, they will push not only Italy, but the entire continent, into recession because they will reduce investments. According to some estimates, these objectives will weigh on our country's spending capacity for 12-13 billion for seven years”. The 5 Star Movement delegation to the European Parliament stated this in a note.
“Investments in the EU's priority areas, namely the climate and digital transition and energy security, are not separated out, but will have to be listed in the plans that the member states will send to Brussels. It is not enough. It is not with this political make-up that we will avoid cuts to services, schools, hospitals, transport and pensions with the complicity of the Meloni government which supported this reform. The only positive news is the separation of the expenses necessary to co-finance EU programmes, but for the rest the line of the rigorists, while the speakers of the European Parliament have lowered the white flag, contenting themselves with a few verbal concessions which essentially change nothing. We will reject this terrible agreement for Italy during the plenary vote”, we read further.
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