Proposition 54K3556

Projet de loi portant ajustement de la loi de finances du 21 décembre 2018 pour l'année budgétaire 2019.

General information ¶

Submitted by

MR Michel Ⅱ

Submission date

Feb. 14, 2019

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

tax national budget provisional twelfth

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

Groen CD&V Vooruit Ecolo LE PS | SP Open Vld MR

Voted to reject

VB

Abstained from voting

∉ N-VA PVDA | PTB

Party dissidents ¶

• Peter Luykx (CD&V) abstained from voting.
• Olivier Maingain (MR) abstained from voting.

Contact form ¶

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Discussion ¶

Feb. 28, 2019 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

Mr Piedboeuf, reporter, refers to the written report.

Mr. Speaker, colleagues, my group will abstain when voting on this draft. We will not approve it. For us, this draft, especially the budget increases contained in it, is an illustration and the forerunner of the budgetary deflation that awaits us. The current Minister of Finance has, by the way, already warned of a budgetary deflation.

The worst of all is that this budget deflation is the result of a combination of a number of very conscious choices of this minority government, this amputating government in ongoing affairs.

The first conscious choice was that Open Vld, CD&V and MR came to an alternate majority in the Chamber. These parties have set their biggest and most loyal ally for the bloc by forming an alternate majority, blowing up confidence in the government. However, the Swedish coalition last year, despite the fact that 2018 was a lost year on budgetary level, at federal level had achieved a hair after a budget balance, thanks to the many initiatives of good policy of the previous years. It is a very regrettable case, but when the alternate majority was formed, the parties involved knew very well what the consequences would be. It was a very conscious choice.

The second conscious choice consisted in not making a government declaration with the rapidly formed minority government – that minority government had to be formed very quickly, because our country had to be absolutely bound in Marrakesh – and not asking for the confidence of the House. Despite a question from two-thirds of House members in that sense, a government declaration with a vote of confidence was rejected. The minority government has very consciously chosen not to ask for trust and therefore not to be able to work further.

Third, it was a very conscious choice to actually stop taking any initiative after the government resigned. There was no attempt to form a new coalition, nor was it chosen, as in any other normal country where a government can no longer function and fall, to simply go to the voter. In a normal country, in such cases, elections are immediately proclaimed, but in this country it is apparently not possible or it is not. Thus, it was consciously made the choice to do nothing for months and to keep moving forward.

It was, fourth, the conscious choice to not take any initiative, even in the minority government. There was no search for well-selected savings, although the minority parties know that they can constantly find us as a partner for savings, as we have consistently hammered on savings in spending.

You do not do that. And the other option, to go to the left and find a partner in the left parties to close the budget hole with tax increases, something they are always ready for, even for that, they did not choose. It was explicitly chosen to rely on the facts, to do nothing at the expense of the budget.

Colleagues, normally things are ongoing after the elections, when the voter has spoken and the cards are shaken, when one is looking for a working coalition. The elections are then behind the back, all the tide is over, one is looking for cooperation.

In this case, it is not done. In this case, one deliberately chose ongoing affairs before elections, to go here for a very long period, for more than a hundred days, into ongoing affairs in anticipation of elections.

What do you get if you go into ongoing matters before elections? Then there will be a sinter class policy. That is what we are getting here. You see there one after the other little initiative, despite the ongoing affairs and despite the fact that one is budgetally very tightly bound.

There is the announcement of Minister of Finance De Croo to reduce the VAT on digital newspapers. Can this be done in ongoing events? Suddenly, on that level, one can apparently distribute money or generate less income.

There was the decision of Liberal Minister De Backer to reduce the licensing costs for wireless connections. This is something I have been asking for nine years, but that was not honored for budgetary reasons. Now one is in ongoing affairs, now one is very tightly budgetary bound and can suddenly do.

It is also the deliberate choice of this rest government to leave all the royal decrees of Minister Peeters, royal decrees of the labour agreement, royal decrees that would strengthen our activation policy, which would increase our efficiency level and thus have a positive effect on the budget, in the slide of Kris Peeters.

Moreover, even the consultation of the social partners is now being glued up with another pack of tax money and inactivation measures, such as a postponement of the tightening of the SWT. One can now suddenly play sinterklaas, let the matter disappear and make a number of deliberate choices where the budget is the child of the account.

Conclusion in that regard, the only initiatives taken so far from that minority government have a fairly high level of sinterglass. This is a budget that is not being drawn at the moment. The cost is for the next generation. The generation that today advocates for climate is the child of account due to the lack of budgetary orthodoxy of this minority government.

Therefore, we will not approve this adjustment of the fiscal law. Of course, not because we would not want to extra money to be able to pay the pensions. That is obvious and therefore we will refrain, but we cannot accept that one deliberately chooses not to close the budget gap in other ways, not to take any initiative and to simply rest in it and let the stuff rot. We do not participate in that.

Mr. Speaker, I will only answer the questions of Mr. Dedecker.

I am very surprised – not shocked, because there are not many things that shock me – about this verdict. It is as if he is trying to escape his responsibility, for the fact that the N-VA has consciously decided to leave the government and has consciously chosen this situation of ongoing affairs.

and fake news.

You know a lot about fake news.

I also hear Mr. Dedecker speaking about the new generation and the costs this government would incur. This gives me the opportunity to recall a discussion we had in the Finance Committee, during which we were entitled to a frontal attack on the budgets added for the budget adjustment of the Finance Act 1 on, for example, Ms. De Block’s asylum policy which would add the 62.3 million euros. This allowed me to explain to Mr. Dedecker an obvious thing: the amounts added, today, are for three-quarters those that we should add consequently to Mr. Francken’s asylum policy. This has nothing to do with a new policy.

So, it’s okay to tweet shortcuts to shake the public opinion and come to the tribune to explain that you’re worried about our children, but in this case, we stay on the manoeuvre, we continue to manage and we don’t run away on fake news.

You have a point, Mrs. Minister, you know a lot about fake news. That is true, because we hear a reversal of the facts here. The initiative to reach an alternate majority and blow up the government was not an initiative of the N-VA. This was an initiative of your party, Mrs. Minister, together with your coalition colleagues.

With an alternate majority, you blow up the matter. You know that too well. Furthermore, it would be a complete punishment that one party alone is responsible for a budgetary deflation. It cannot be knocked from any side. The budget deflation is, as I just explained, the result of a number of deliberate choices made by your party and your coalition partners.

Mr. Speaker, I agree with Mrs. Minister. We saw here in December that the N-VA left the government and refused to approve the budget approved in the committee here in the plenary session. This was denied by the N-VA. There have been behind the scenes talks with the prime minister to do that anyway, but your party has pertinently refused that, Mr. Dedecker. If you now say that it is our fault that the budget displaces, then you turn everything around. I feel shame in your place.

It takes two to tango, Mr. Vandenput. You know that. If you want to make an agreement on a budget, then that is an agreement on everything. We have asked to continue the agreed – very good – policy of the Swedish coalition uninterruptedly, but what have we got? Both Kris Peeters and Maggie De Block announced a complete switch of the policy. Can you not be surprised that we do not authorize the government to conduct a policy other than the approved policy?

In fact, we were right. The royal decrees that remain in Kris Peeters’ slide, meanwhile, are countless. His shift surely flows from the royal decrees agreed in the previous government of Michel I. Your party also fails to get them published.

I can only state that it is a pity that you have dropped out of the government with a drogreed and have not approved the budget. This was decided by the entire Chamber in December. Try not to put the debt for future generations in our shoes now. That is just your fault.

I assume, colleague Vandenput, that your party was very keen to bind our country to a so-called non-binding treaty in Marrakesh, but that you, meanwhile, are not able to honor agreements and to effectively keep Kris Peeters’ promises.

I suggest that we keep that.