Prime Minister Andrej Babiš wants to meet with Senate President Miloš Vystrčil (ODS) due to tax changes that passed the Chamber of Deputies from Thursday to Friday. Babiš wants the approved draft to be changed by the Senate on some points and sent back to the deputies for final approval.
Prime Minister Andrej Babiš (YES) wants to negotiate with Senate President Miloš Vystrčil (ODS) about the upper house eliminating the growth of the taxpayer discount from the tax package. “I wrote a letter to the President of the Senate because of this,” Babiš said in a video on social networks on Sunday.
On Saturday, the Minister of Finance, Alena Schillerová (for YES), expressed the same wishes as the Prime Minister. Babiš denied that reducing the income tax rate to 15 percent would mean a disruption of public finances in the Czech Republic, as claimed by some experts, opposition politicians and the government CSSD.
The proposal of pirate deputy Mikuláš Ferjenčík, according to which the basic tax rebate per taxpayer will increase from CZK 24,840 to the average gross salary for the previous year, was approved this week by deputies of ODS, Pirates, SPD, CSSD, People’s Party and TOP 09. an alternative to Babiš’s proposal to abolish the super-gross wage and an income tax rate of 15 percent, which was approved mainly thanks to ANO, ODS and SPD.
He pushed out on Twitter over the weekend, saying that it was up to Babiš and Schiller to hear from him about the tax package in the Senate. Babiš said today that he responded to the call. “We will act, we will persuade the Senate and especially the ODS,” he said. Together with TOP 09, the ODS has the strongest club in the upper chamber, which has 27 senators.
The chairman of the Civic Democrats, Petr Fiala, will also meet with ODS senators at the beginning of the week, he said on Czech Television today. “We will look for a solution that has a chance to gain a majority in the Senate,” he said. According to him, it is important to find a way to compensate the municipalities for the money they will lose due to Babiš’s proposal.
According to Vystrčil, the tax package will not be “laid on roses” in the Senate. The STAN senatorial club, which is the second strongest with 24 members, wrote on Facebook today that it considers the approval of the package to be an irresponsible move. “The YES movement, together with the support of the SPD and the ODS, is leading the country to a deficit of almost 500 billion crowns next year,” STAN criticizes. The club is annoyed by the income restrictions of municipalities and regions. In the Senate, he wants to do everything against “eating the future”.
The government CSSD is also ready to negotiate with all senatorial clubs. “I would like to present our concept of abolishing the super-gross wage and increasing the discount on taxpayers without devastating effects on state, regional and municipal budgets,” CSSD head Jan Hamáček said on Twitter. According to him, the decision of YES, ODS and SPD needs to be corrected.
According to Babiš, the pirate proposal deepens the budget deficit by 35 billion and “is not subject to the social need test”, but the reduction of income tax will help employees, sole traders and companies. On the contrary, the coalition CSSD, which unsuccessfully enforced the 19 percent rate, claims that Babiš’s proposal helps mainly people with high incomes and causes a disruption of public finances in the Czech Republic. Grandma refused. “Don’t say we have broken finances. We have the best finances in Europe, public budgets even better,” he said.
The Prime Minister also rejected the accusations of the regions, which will lose income due to the budget shortfall. According to him, the cabinet is ready for a serious debate with the governors, which will be about specific numbers, not politics. The past and current government has significantly increased the revenues of regions and municipalities, Babiš added.
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