Greek lawmakers began another emergency debate today on further economic reforms demanded by international creditors in return for a new bailout _ a vote that could threaten the survival of the coalition government.
The vote on changes to the judicial and banking sectors is one of the requirements that Greece’s European creditors insisted upon for negotiations on a third bailout worth around 85 billion euros to begin.
After losing the support of a large chunk of his own party’s lawmakers during a vote last week, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has to rely on support from pro-European opposition parties to gain parliamentary approval.
Negotiations with creditors are expected to start soon after the vote later. The Greek government’s hope is that they conclude before August 20, when Greece must repay loans worth more than 3 billion euros to the European Central Bank.
The measures demanded by creditors for a bailout have caused much consternation within Tsipras’ radical left Syriza party. Many, including former finance minister Yanis Varoufakis, voted against last week’s austerity measures, which included big increases to sales taxes that came into effect at the start of this week. If more than a handful more dissent later, then Tsipras’ government could be in peril.
The party’s traditional base within the trade union movement is also angry at what it sees as Tsipras’ betrayal of his electoral mandate.
A union representing civil servants is planning an anti-government protest outside parliament before the vote that is expected around midnight local time.
Tsipras has accused party critics of acting irresponsibly.
“I’ve seen a lot of reactions and heroic statements, but so far I haven’t heard any alternative proposal,” Tsipras told party lawmakers yesterday, according to a senior government official.
The reforms to be voted on today are aimed at reducing the country’s court backlog and speeding up revenue-related cases. Lawmakers have also been called to approve reforms related to banking union mechanisms, aimed at reducing the risk for European governments from bank crises.
Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos (Pictured in Parliament today) said planned pension spending cuts required “further study” before being submitted to parliament.
In Brussels, Pierre Moscovici, the European Union’s top economy official, said he’s shooting for a mid-August timescale for the signing of a bailout deal, while accepting that Greece has to meet a “punishing” schedule.
Figures from the European Union’s statistics agency today showed that the country was making some progress on the debt front at the start of the year, progress that’s going to have been badly impacted by recent events.
Following repayments to European creditors and the International Monetary Fund, Eurostat said Greek debt fell to 301 billion euros at the end of the first quarter from 317 billion at the end of 2014. That took the country’s debt burden down to 168.8 percent from 177.1 percent.
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