Italy has got back on track and the credit goes to families and businesses. But the government, which prefers to use "a certain restraint" in attributing the merits of the recovery, is keen to underline: "We didn't get by".
With these key statements, Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni opened the traditional year-end press conference which, he said, this time also coincides with the end of the legislature. “We have achieved the goal we set ourselves, that of reaching an orderly end to the legislature. We managed to avoid an abrupt end to the legislature which could have had devastating effects,” the premier said.
“We didn't get by, my government made few announcements but took many decisions. My government was born in very difficult circumstances: the defeat in the constitutional referendum, the resignation of Renzi, the divisions in the majority. But having said that, we didn't get by". The legislature, he continued, was “troubled, but in my opinion it was a fruitful legislature. The truth is that Italy has got back on track after the worst crisis since the war. The main merit is of families and businesses, of work, of those who study and of those who take care of people, politics must have a certain restraint in thinking that the merit is its. On the agenda of the next legislature, ambition and reforms cannot be missing, woe to imagine a future of small cabotage. The next legislature will have to translate the recovery into mending social wounds", giving "more work and reduction of inequalities".
While Paolo Gentiloni's opening speech continues and the question and answer session by journalists will follow, the dissolution of the Chambers is approaching. After the press conference, Prime Minister Gentiloni is expected at the Quirinale: he will not resign but will have an interview with the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella. He will dictate the times and ways of the next institutional steps but the expectation is that the decision on the dissolution of Parliament you arrive in the afternoon. Elections are scheduled for March 4.
