To stay at Palazzo Chigi, Giuseppe Conte asks Lega and Movimento 5 Stelle to sign a truce setting aside the permanent electoral campaign, also because the next few months will be very difficult. There is to lead the negotiations on the accounts with the European Union and on this front the Head of Government he asks for a free hand, because he doesn't intend to go down in history as the first Prime Minister to sign one Community infringement procedure against our country. This, in summary, is the meaning of the speech that Conte will deliver on Monday afternoon with the markets closed, addressing all Italians. If positive answers do not come from Luigi Di Maio and Matteo Salvini, thelawyer of the Italians he'll go back to being a lawyer and that's it.
The Premier was convinced to take the road of the ultimatum after the incredible mess on the reply letter to the EU, which reached the press before Brussels to the spite of the usual mysterious little hand.
Conte knows well that the match with Europe is decisive for the stability of the country. And he also knows – from Brussels they let it be known informally – that the letter of justification sent on Friday by the Minister of the Treasury, Giovanni Tria, was judged insufficient. Too vague commitments, rough estimates.
This is why the European Commission will conclude its report on Italy on Wednesday by giving the green light to the infringement procedure for non-compliance with the rules on debt. However, the last word on the decision - which would impose restrictive measures on Italy for at least five years - will be up to the EU finance ministers, who will meet to the Ecofin on 9 July.
In the meantime, Conte hopes to have restarted the government's now dead engine. But the Premier's attempt doesn't seem to have many chances of success: it is too improbable that this majority will be convinced to vote for a corrective maneuver of the public accounts. He would mean excluding the possibility of inclusion in the autumn budget the flat tax deficit, on which Salvini has returned to press decisively after the triumph in the Europeans.
The crisis is already in the making and the feeling is that the two allies are waiting for nothing more than a pretext to make it official.
