Green light from the Council of Ministers

Def, GDP 2024 at 1%, debt rises to 137.8%. Text sent to Parliament

In the Nadef the planned GDP for this year was at +1.2 %. Debt at 137.8% this year, rising to 138.9% in 2025 and 139.8% in 2026

by Redaction Rome

9 April 2024

Giorgetti: "Il Def avrà una conformazione più leggera"

5' min read

Key points

EU Commission: OK to states for leaner stability plans
Debt rises but remains under 140%, in 2024 it is 137.8%
Giorgetti: aim to replicate wedge cut in 2025
"If needed, we will intervene again on the Superbonus"
"We will present new Def even before 20 September"
On Pnrr: 'After green light war breaks out in EU, I insist on extension'
The other measures on the government's table

5' min read

The Council of Ministers approved the Economic and Financial Document. The GDP for 2024 was set at +1%. In the Nadef the programmatic GDP for this year was at +1.2%. The veil is therefore lifted today on the new estimates for the Italian economy with the approval of the Def under consideration by the Council of Ministers. The meeting lasted about an hour. The public finance documents contain the economic and financial policies decided by the government. Over the past decades, policy documents have increasingly assumed a key role in defining and setting out the country's economic policy guidelines.

The Ministry of Economy and Finance sent the Def approved by the Council of Ministers this morning to the Houses of Parliament. This was announced by the ministry in a note.

However, what has been given the green light by the Cdm is a Economic and Financial Document that only indicates the trend framework, and is therefore destined to change soon: in the text there are no programmatic estimates that represent the direction in which the government intends to move. "The lack of the programmatic is not a new fact, it has already occurred in four previous ones," recalled Economy Minister Giancarlo Giorgetti, speaking at a press conference at the end of the executive meeting at Palazzo Chigi. "Our forecasts are seen as downward compared to the Nafef for growth, we are moving to a forecast of 1% down by 0.2% compared to what was forecast last year," the economy minister added. These are 'very complicated forecasts to make because of a complicated international and geopolitical framework'.

EU Commission: OK to states for leaner stability plans

European Commission spokesperson Veerle Nuyts in the daily briefing, when asked about the Italian Def in a leaner version this year with only trend data, clarified that Brussels "recognises that member states are focusing on preparing medium-term structural budget plans. The Commission services have been in contact with all member states and have informed them that in the current circumstances they will not require member states to comply with the guidelines on the format and content of the stability programmes of the disability and convergence programmes' to be submitted in April.

Trend Defence: debt rises but remains under 140%, in 2024 it is 137.8%

Going back to the Def, the debt is at 137.8 per cent this year, rising to 138.9 per cent in 2025 and 139.8 per cent in 2026. Thus, in the tendential framework of the Def, the only one indicated in the Document approved by the CDM, the debt reverses course with respect to the downward path indicated in the Nadef, also in light of the 2023 figure closed, according to ISTAT data with a sharp drop, at 137.3% of GDP. In the planning framework indicated in the Nadef in the autumn, the debt fell progressively from 140.1 per cent in 2024 to 139.9 per cent in 2025, to 139.6 per cent in 2026.

Giorgetti: aim to replicate wedge cut also in 2025

"The decontribution that expires in 2024, we absolutely intend to replicate it in 2025, this is the real goal we set ourselves when we go to define the structural programme," Giorgetti explained. The head of the Mef recalled that the rising public debt forecast by the Defence Minister's Office "is heavily conditioned by the cash reflections of the superbonus in the coming years" but, he added, after 2026 "it would start to fall "Giorgetti.

"If needed, we will intervene again on the Superbonus"

'I want to report exactly the programmatic objectives of the Nadef, the projection of 2025 and 2026: if necessary we will intervene further on the decree law now before Parliament'. This is how Giorgetti responded to those who asked him whether there will be a new intervention on the superbonus to maintain the deficit path by refinancing the decontribution. "When the budget law is made, forms will be found to confirm" the decontribution, he added, "because it is the number one priority". "What will not cease now is the verification and control of the goodness of these debts arising from the superbonus, which has already led, to date, to about 16 billion credits cancelled and seized for various reasons," the minister added. "This operation of verifying the goodness of all these debts owed, or declared as such, to the State will continue and I believe it is one of the most important parts of the tax assessment and verification operation that we have to do this year."

"We will present new Def even before 20 September"

As for the next steps, 'The deadline for the presentation of the new Def, the fiscal structural programme, is set for 20 September,' Giorgetti announced, 'but it is our wish to present it even earlier, when all the elements will be available, starting with the technical trajectory' planned for 'mid-June by the EU'. "This Def,' the minister continued, 'takes into account the decisions, the revolution of the fiscal budget rules in the EU. What is missing are the implementing provisions, the instructions for constructing the path'.

On Pnrr: 'After go-ahead war breaks out in EU, I insist on extension'

One passage of the minister's speech at the press conference was on the NRP. On the extension of the timeframe of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan to allow a horizon beyond 2026 'I have already asked Europe for an extension,' said Giorgetti, 'but they advised against it, so I insist. I don't know if you realised that after the approval of the NRP a war broke out in Europe. In Brussels I would not like it to be done like in Rome, that the extension is decided the day before,' instead it would be preferable to decide well in advance also 'to ease tension and pressure on prices'. 'I am the minister of the economy,' he continued, 'Gentiloni is the commissioner, Lagarde is the governor of the central bank: may I express my wish, is it blasphemy? Among fellow ministers we all say this to each other, the commission remains firm, who knows, maybe the next one will evaluate differently'.

The other measures on the government's table

The Government meeting at Palazzo Chigi got underway in the late morning. In addition to the DEF, also on the agenda was the draft law for the ratification of the Agreement between Italy and Albania on social security signed in Rome on 6 February last, and the preliminary examination of a legislative decree with provisions for the rationalisation of registration tax, tax on successions and donations , stamp duty and other indirect taxes other than VAT. The final examination of a decree of the President of the Republic with amendments to the regulation for the execution of the Navigation Code, and the preliminary examination of another decree of the President of the Republic on the regulation of the organisation of the offices of direct collaboration of the Minister of Agriculture and the Independent Performance Assessment Body are also planned.

In Cdm theme of schools closed for religious festivities, rule being studied

The issue of school closures for religious holidays such as Ramadan, as in the case of the Pioltello institute, has reached the Council of Ministers. According to several sources, Education Minister Giuseppe Valditara has illustrated the issue to his colleagues, explaining that he is working on a solution. One of the hypotheses being studied would be a rule to prevent schools from authorising absences linked to religious holidays unless there are agreements between the State and religious denominations.