Italy’s Five Star, Democrats Clash in Search for Common Agenda
Italy’s Five Star, Democrats Clash in Search for Common Agenda
(Bloomberg) -- The leader of Italy’s anti-establishment Five Star Movement gave premier-designate Giuseppe Conte a list of policy demands as a condition for a new alliance with the center-left Democratic Party, prompting new tension between the prospective partners.
“The points in our program are clear,” Luigi Di Maio, head of Five Star and outgoing deputy premier, told reporters Friday after meeting Conte, who is putting together a cabinet and a policy agenda for a new coalition. “We can get things going if these points become part of the government’s program, otherwise we must go back to the polls as soon as possible.”
After earlier falling as much as five basis points, Italy’s 10-year bond yield rose two points to 1.01% as investors reacted to Di Maio explicitly raising the possibility of new elections. Italy’s FTSE MIB dropped 0.3%, erasing a gain of as much as 0.8%, with banks leading the declines.
Di Maio handed Conte a list of 20 demands, according to a Five Star official, including requests to avert an automatic sales tax hike in the 2020 budget, introduce a minimum wage, cut the tax burden, review highway concessions, separate investment and commercial banks, counter illegal immigration, speed up justice and reduce the number of lawmakers.
The Five Star leader has been under pressure to switch the focus of the talks from jobs to policies after the Democrats, or PD, accused him of insisting on wanting to stay on as deputy premier in a new administration. Di Maio has said that he puts the country’s interests first, not his own.
Di Maio’s stand stoked tensions with the Democrats, similar to the skirmishes which plagued the outgoing administration of Five Star and the rightist League party of Matteo Salvini. Conte is expected to report back to President Sergio Mattarella next week with a list of ministers and a common program after Five Star and the PD told the head of state they were willing to work together.
Di Maio’s demands swiftly prompted a protest from the PD. “Di Maio’s ultimatums to the premier-designate are really unacceptable,” Graziano Delrio, head of PD lawmakers in the lower house, said in comments cited by newswire Ansa.
To contact the reporter on this story: John Follain in Rome at jfollain2@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Ben Sills at bsills@bloomberg.net, Iain Rogers, Andrew Blackman
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