Nastase Cabinet torn between austerity budget and electoral pledges

Nastase Cabinet feels caught “between a rock and hard place” when it comes to debating the budget, as it cannot meet the requests for more money to be granted to certain fields.

The requests come from Opposition parties, which conditioned the final vote on the budget draft to agreeing to certain amendments.

Much more flexible than in the Budget-Finance Committees, the Party of Social Democracy (PDSR) is trying to please the Opposition parties, which kept the same critical stand during the general debates on the budget.

PM Adrian Nastase expressed the Government’s willingness to make “great efforts” to accept those amendments that can be supported financially.

The Cabinet head, however, admitted to being “caught between a rock and hard place,” as he would have to face requests for more money from the budget, which he could not honour, though.

Even under these austerity circumstances, the PM announced a cut in the salary tax for those working in the IT field. “The Finance Ministry in 30 days will draft a distinct regulation for taxing those employed in the IT field.

The Government is trying to find solutions to cut the tax gradually and revise the VAT quota next year, ” Nastase said. His statement came as a response to an issue brought during the general debates by Deputy Varujan Pambuccian, chairman of the IT parliamentary committee.

Nastase Cabinet brushed the salary tax cut three weeks ago, taking back only after three days the ordinance that approved the salary tax cut.

The drop in taxes is not the only promise PDSR failed to deliver on. The governing party through Florin Georgescu announced a delay in increasing the state allowances for children and the re-correlation of pensions. PDSR feels that the one to blame for these effects is the former PM Mugur Isarescu.

“The electoral measures taken by the former Government on its very last days in office influenced this year’s GDP by more than 1%,” PDSR’s main man, Florin Georgescu, maintained.

The political endorsement of the Opposition parties for the budget draft is yet uncertain, and, following the general debates in Parliament’s plenum, the National Liberal Party (PNL) and the Democrat Party (PD) keep on conditioning their final vote to agreeing to certain amendments, while the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR) and Greater Romania Party (PRM) are still hesitating about stating their positions. The only party to vote for the budget “in full confidence” is PDSR.

All Opposition parties have criticised the budget draft, even harshly at times, from the Parliament’s floor, reminding they are the ones who have the final vote “weapon.”