Eliminate or minimize payment delays in commercial transactions: this is the objective of the six bills being examined by the Productive Activities Committees of the Chamber. Last week the subject was addressed in a select committee, which met on Thursday for a new round. “The phenomenon of late payment in commercial transactions represents a real obstacle to the growth of businesses and particularly affects small ones, which are already strongly affected by the difficulties in accessing bank credit”, underlines Manuela Dal Lago, president of the commission. “Compared with the 70-80 billion euro of credit that Italian companies have with the public administration – continues Dal Lago -, the government allocates only 6 and has only 3 available: really crumbs. The State must undertake to pay all that is due".
There are 6 bills on the table, which will obviously have to converge into a single text. The Northern League member Manuela Dal Lago, the first signatory of one of these bills, indicates what legal instruments could be that would allow companies to recover their credits with less effort, allowing them to plan their investments with greater tranquility: "First of all, it is necessary introduce certain and mandatory payment terms, setting the payment term in commercial transactions as the thirtieth day from the date of delivery or shipment of the goods and provide for a fine for violators of the maximum limits. Furthermore, it is necessary to set up a revolving fund for the transfer of credits to companies at the chambers of commerce, industry, crafts and agriculture, which companies suffering from non-payment or delayed payment of credits can access. In our proposal we then envisage the automatic registration of the defaulting debtor in the computerized register of protests held by the territorially competent chambers of commerce, which will have an effect of accelerating the payment by the debtor so as not to end up in the register itself".
Dal Lago photographs a reality that he does not hesitate to define as "alarmed, because the problem in our country is far more consistent than in other European countries. In the European Union it takes an average of 63 days for the payment of an invoice by the public administration and the days are reduced on average to 55 for the payment by a private company, while in Italy the average payment times in the public administration are of 186 days, while the private company pays on average in 96 days. It is evident – concludes the president of the Productive Activities commission – that similar attitudes risk generating irreparable damage to our entrepreneurial fabric by depriving it of the necessary resources to invest in growth and development”.
