Cuts to golden superpensions, closure of public bodies such as Cnel, slimming cures for blue cars and Rai and reorganization of the police corps. These are some of the ingredients for the spending review, announced by the extraordinary commissioner for the spending review Carlo Cottarelli, who spoke today in the Senate Budget Committee. With this recipe, the savings for the current year (the last eight months of 2014) could be 3 billion. But the goal - ambitious - is to reach 18 billion by 2015 and 34 by 2016.
“Yesterday evening I presented my proposals for the spending review to the Interministerial Committee in full autonomy,” Cottarelli said. “I believe that out of the three billion we can do – he added, speaking of the programme's objectives – but it depends on when we start, if we do the right things and there is the effort”.
The Cottarelli plan envisages 33 actions divided into two groups: those already applicable in 2014 and the structural reforms which must be started this year but whose effects will be visible in the next 3 years.
The commissioner immediately put the spotlight on pension expenditure, defined as "very high" (around 270 billion euro), and proposed "a temporary contribution for pensions beyond a certain threshold essentially to allow for the recruitment of new people ”, intervening on the “social charges for new hires”. The cut would not touch 85% of pensions, affecting only the gold ones.
The spending review also passes through public bodies. Some of these “can be eliminated or rationalized – Cottarelli points out – Among those to be eliminated, for example, I would have identified the National Council for the Economy and Labor (Cnel).
The commissioner then expressed his intention to "reduce the cost of bank commissions that the State pays to collect taxes" and to obtain savings also thanks to "synergies and better coordination between the police forces".
The spending review also passes through Viale Mazzini. For Rai "some further savings could still come from a rationalization of the presence in the area - explained the commissioner - by law Rai must have offices throughout Italy, but to ensure the service it may not necessarily be present in all regions".
Touch popular themes, like blue cars. “I believe – Cottarelli said – that they should be maintained only for ministers and that for the others there is a pool of five cars per ministry. The same should be done at the territorial level”.
As regards the costs of the national health system, "the number of inappropriate hospitalizations must be reduced" and "a more direct application of standard costs is needed".
Significant savings should also come from spending on real estate at the level of the State and local authorities: two billion euros within 3 years.
The spending review train passes by the tracks, the real ones. “Transfers from the state to rail transport per kilometer are 55% higher in Italy than in the euro area average. Therefore, an operation to improve efficiency and review tariffs is needed in this area.
Still on the subject of transfers, Cottarelli wants to intervene on those to companies by the State and the regions: the cuts would be "a little less than 4 billion at the State level and perhaps a couple of billion at the regional level".
