“I am convinced that we are all up to the challenge. All the conditions are in place” for Italy not to exceed the 3% deficit-to-GDP ratio. The prime minister said, Enrico Letta, responding to the signs of concern that arrived today from Brussels on the state of health of the Italian public finances.
The alarm was raised in the morning by Olli Rehn: "Italy has experienced some political turbulence - said the Commissioner for Economic Affairs of the European Union -, but now focus on economic reforms": for the return to recovery "political stability is essential", also because "the Italy's latest economic data is not good”.
Along the same lines, the president of the Eurogroup, Jeroen Dijsselbloem: "For Italy the most important thing is political stability".
Letta then underlined how the coming months are "very important for the credibility and seriousness of our country: we will keep our commitments with respect to our debts, but we must be serious, we must not always seem to be on the verge of a boiling volcano".
Already yesterday there European Central Bank had addressed clear words towards Italy, warning that at the moment the public accounts do not guarantee compliance with the 3% deficit threshold: "The worsening, mainly due to the disbursement of support to the financial sector and the repayment of arrears - law in the latest ECB bulletin – highlights the growing risks to achieving the general government deficit target in 2013”.
