The state budget is always a two-sided coin, one of which balances revenue and expenditure. It is vital to safeguard the international credibility of the country’s economy, Prime Minister António Costa said on Thursday.
Costa delivered the message on making ends meet during a meeting with lawmakers from his Socialist Party (PS) in parliament to discuss the government’s 2022 finance bill.
Accompanied by Minister of State and Finance João Leão, Costa underlined the “fundamental” importance of balancing the accounts – a theme he underlined last Saturday at a meeting of the National Party Committee.
“We must [ensure] economic recovery, we need to strengthen public services, but we need to balance the books, ”he said. “Thanks to this trajectory, making it compatible with turning the page on austerity with a balanced budget, Portugal came out of the European Union’s excessive deficit procedure and saw the rating agencies revalue the Republic,” even going so far as to have a problem [of treasury bonds] this year when the ten-year interest rate was negative.
“It’s a very big asset,” he said, stressing the need to maintain the “international credibility” of the country.
(Pedro Morais Fonseca | Lusa.pt)
