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THE CORONAVIRUS CRISIS is a challenge to “the existence of Europe”, Italy’s prime minister has said – and warned that the EU could fail as a result of the pandemic.
In an interview with the BBC, Giuseppe Conte said that “if we don’t seize the opportunity to put new life into the European project, the risk is real”.
“That’s why I won’t allow it to materialise, I want to banish it,” Conte said. “If our response isn’t strong and unified, if Europe fails to come up with a monetary, financial policy adequate for the biggest challenge since the Second World War, not only Italians but European citizens will be deeply disappointed.”
Alongside Spain, Italy has been badly impacted by Covid-19 and over 17,000 people have died from the virus in the country. However, there have been signs of hope with deaths, hospital stays and new infections levelling off.
The EU is still in the process of putting together a financial package to support states through the crisis – however so far states are divided over what exactly that package will look like.
Italy and Spain, backed by France, want to throw all the EU’s economic might into fighting the virus and damage from the disruption it has caused as soon as possible. Italy has rejected using the bailout fund, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM).
Instead Italy, backed by France, Spain and six other countries, have pushed to go even further than using the ESM and rely on a shared bond issue backed by all countries to raise money at low interest rates and favourable conditions such as long repayment.
“I feel pain for the gaping wound that Italians are enduring,” Conte said in the interview.
“It’s a pain that is always with me because they’re astonishing numbers. But behind the numbers are names and surnames, life stories, stories of broken families and this causes me deep sadness.”
“The Italian nation is suffering.”
With reporting from Press Association
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Take that Belgium you f*ckers.
Ha!
I can’t wait to get out of this kip, maybe go to a country where good news feels good, instead of this hole where good news is nothing more than propaganda for the sheepies
The grass is always greener…
I wouldn’t buy a used car off him. Everything is looking rosy, except we owe around 200 billion and are still borrowing about 9 billion a year. But if they still want to give it to us we’ll take it.
That’s not his comments or what his job is. His job is just to get the best loan rate and that’s what he’s commenting on.
So what is our debt to GDP ratio ? Irish Times today says it was 123.7 % at end 2013. Corrigan says it’s under 100% ?
It’s not his fault we owe 200BN. Remember “we all partied !!!”……..now if they get us to repeat it often enough………..
So what! Massive money printing and zero interest rates is forcing investors to invest in junk bonds like ours to get any sort of return coupled with Dragi saying he’d intervene if countries were close to default is pushing down interest rates. Greece’s bonds are also around 3.6% Ffs and they defaulted to the tune of 100bn! The fact of the matter is austerity and Keynesianism for the banks has increased debt and risk in the world economy, setting us up for a monster crash bigger than 2007! What will that mean for us? Confiscation of savings and destruction of pensions, further collapse in income and ever widening wealth and income gaps. Whupdedoo!
I think as a country we need to decide what the bottom is in terms of support. It seems we just can’t decide how far left we are trying to go. Until then people will always feel hard done by.
Hooray!!!
I don’t judge my economy on how good our bond yields are or how many new McJobs have been created. I judge it on how well the state cares for kids with special needs or how many homeless I see sleeping in doorways in Dublin’s business district every morning.
People matter more than interest on bonds.
have your say