The Romanian government has for the first time tackled the draft legislation on a new set of fiscal-budgetary measures.
The PSD-PNL government coalition in Bucharest on Wednesday night held its first talks over the new series of measures aimed at achieving a long-term balanced state budget and easing the EU-budget absorption. Romania's Finance Minister Marcel Boloş, who is a foreign minister, recalls that Romania has pledged to clear the budget deficit target of 4.4%. And if it fails to achieve that, it faces the risk of seeing major EU fund cuts from the European Commission, funds that are crucial in the process of streamlining the country's infrastructure, including motorways, hospitals and schools.
Besides reducing public expenses, the CEO wants to fight tax evasion, improve income taxation and reduce fiscal privileges. In an effort to decrease the anxiety caused by the upcoming higher taxes and prices, the same Finance Minister said that prices will actually be raised while banks and small enterprises will pay higher taxes, but the VAT will only be for certain goods and services.
The Three Party Social Dialogue Council, a body that consists of government officials, employers' associations and trade unions, had tackled the new fiscal-budgetary measures before the government session.
According to their president Florin Jianu, the Employers' Associations seem to be contented with the decision, as they got the promise that the measures will be applied as of January 1st 2024 and the VAT will remain unchanged in the hospitality industry.
Trade unions, however, are dissatisfied with the decision to offer holiday vouchers only to state employees with salary up to 16 hundred euros. In response, Social-Democratic Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu said:
Prime Minister Ciolacu is expected to present the aforementioned package of fiscal-budgetary measures to Parliament next week.
The new measures, which have attracted a lot of heat from the opposition, have been described by the country's president, Klaus Iohannis, as a step in the right direction.