Brussels already requested budget proposal for Portugal and 17 countries
The information is on the community executive’s website, which specifies that the Portuguese proposal for OE2022 was delivered last Friday, together with countries such as Austria, France, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Lithuania, Malta, Netherlands, Slovenia, Spain.
Earlier, last Thursday, the budget projects for 2022 from Slovakia, Finland, Latvia and Luxembourg arrived in Brussels.
The remaining nine other EU countries have yet to submit their projects to the Commission.
Last week, the Government delivered the State Budget 2022 to the Assembly of the Republic, which forecasts the Portuguese economy to grow 4.8% in 2021 and 5.5% in 2022.
In the document, the executive estimates that the deficit of national public accounts should be 4.3% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2021 and drop to 3.2% in 2022, also predicting that the Portuguese unemployment rate will decrease to 6.5% next year, “reaching the lowest value since 2003”.
Public debt is expected to reach 122.8% of GDP in 2022, compared to an estimate of 126.9% for this year.
The first parliamentary debate process of OE2022 will take place between October 22nd and 27th, the day on which the general vote will be taken. The final global vote is scheduled for November 25, at the Portuguese Parliament in Lisbon.
After seven days of tension, complaints, criticisms and accusations against the government, such as leaving the parties to the left, PAN and non-attached female MPs about OE2022 were resumed this week.
On Saturday night, the day after having asked party delegations at the Belém Palace, in Lisbon, the President of the Republic stated that he had done in public and private what he could to prevent a political crisis with the parties.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa stated that dialogue on the Budget is expected in the coming days, between the Government and parties, and underlined: “The scenario is not only more desirable, but more natural is that there will be no political crisis.”
On Sunday, the Government made it known that it wants to meet with all the parties with which it has been negotiating the feasibility of the Budget and that it asked the BE to send the content and terms of the proposed written agreement.
In the afternoon, the BE informed that it will send the Government proposals for the articles of nine negotiating points on the table in early September.
The vote on the budget in general – which, if there are no changes, has the vote against the PCP, BE and PEV – is scheduled for October 27th.
Regarding the community vision, the vice-president of the European Commission Valdis Dombrovskis already warned, in September of September, that the EU countries must ensure, in national budgets for 2022, the return of the rules for deficit and debt in the next, after the suspension due to the crisis.