Govt approves 30-bn-euro 2025 budget

(ANSA) - ROME, OCT 16 - The Italian government's draft budgetary plan (DBP) arrived at the European Commission on Wednesday after Premier Giorgia Meloni's government approved its 2025 budget bill with 30 billion euros worth of new measures late on Tuesday.
    The package includes a 1,000-euro bonus for the parents of newborns, although it will be means tested, with wealthier families excluded, as part of efforts to reverse Italy's declining birth rate.
    Banks, which have enjoyed high profits in recent years thanks to the ECB putting up interest rates, and insurance companies will be called on to make a 3.5-billion-euro contribution to the budget, which will to go the national health system.
    "As we had promised, there will be no new taxes for citizens," said Meloni, "3.5 billion from banks and insurance companies will be earmarked for healthcare and the most fragile".
    The budget also maintains cuts in the labour-tax wedge for lower earners that the government made in its 2023 budget law.
    The DBP maintains the Quota 103 scheme that enables people to start claiming a State pension before the retirement age of 67, under certain conditions, if their age and number of years of social-security contributions add up to 103.
    It also includes incentives for people who have reached retirement age to stay in work.
    Around 2.3-2.4 billion euros of the financial coverage for the budget comes from a review of public spending, with ministries told to cut their budgets by around 5%. (ANSA).