|
|
The budget outlined last week by Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and submitted to Brussels for approval sticks to the EU's deficit limit of 3 percent of GDP but cuts the deficit more slowly than promised in so-called "structural" terms, adjusted for the business cycle.
"We're in contact with the Commission. On the 29th the Commission will express its assessment," Padoan said in an interview with RAI state television on Sunday.
However under the reporting timetable laid down by the European Union, an assessment issued by the end of the month would almost certainly mean the budget plans had been rejected, an examination of the rules shows.
Under tightened-up European Union budget rules adopted last year, euro area member states have to submit their draft budget plans by Oct. 15 every year for approval by the European Commission. The Commission is meant to pass the plans by Nov. 30.
However, in cases where the Commission identifies any particularly serious non-compliance with EU budget rules, it has two weeks to issue an assessment asking for the finance plans to be reworked to bring them into line.
"Any opinion issued by the European Commission on Oct. 29, that is within two weeks of the presentation of a euro zone country's draft budget plans, would be in order to request a modification of the programme," said a European Union official, who declined to be cited by name.