Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos has declared definitively that pensions will not be cut and that Greece will return to the markets.
At the same time he ripped into New Democracy, charging that the main opposition party, indifferent to the interests of the country, has invested in danger-mongering.
Appearing before parliament’s finance committee regarding the 2019 draft budget, Tsakalotos said that Greece, like all EU member-states, is proceeding with interventions which it summarily describes in a clear and transparent manner.
“There is no ambiguity about what the government is proposing and is going to do. Pensions will not be cut, and we are taking a part of the additional funding earmarked for planned measures to counter austerity, amounting to 800mn euros,” he told the committee.
Tsakalotos said that the budget is in fact expansive, because the implementation of some of those planned counter-measures has already proceeded.
“Our seriousness as a government is proven by the fact that we had fiscal space in 2018, and that positive measures, such as stipends for children, have already begun to be implemented.”
Tsakalotos charged that New Democracy is “speculating” against the country’s economy.
The finance minister noted that over the past year the main opposition has argued that there is a new, fourth bailout memorandum, because pensions will be cut, but now it is backpedaling, as it sees where things are going, and that Greece will return to the markets.
“I am telling you not to invest in this [argument] once again. In October, 2014, you had a 9.08 percent interest rate, and now you are criticising us at a time when the interest rate is 4.3 percent and is falling over recent months, because we will return to the markets,” he told New Democracy MPs.
He said he was especially perturbed by ND’s “speculation” regarding Greek banks.
