The answers of the director of La Stampa in the webinar “Ask Giannini”

The confrontation with Draghi, Italy’s position on the international scene, but also more national problems such as bureaucracy, health care, social security. Then again the various “reverse” of Prime Minister Meloni. These are some of the main topics addressed in the webinar Ask Giannini of 31 January.

Comparison with Draghi
In the interlocution with Europe, asks Maurizio Busatta, is Giorgia Meloni up to Mario Draghi? One of Meloni’s first choices, as director Giannini analyzes, was to cancel the tax breaks on fuel that had been introduced by the Draghi government and this caused the explosion in petrol and diesel prices. “You can’t steer in reverse. But let’s give the benefit of inventory for the first law of stability – says the director de The print – which for two thirds respects the provisions of the Draghi government, even if for the remaining third it gives bonuses to the categories that voted on the right. Now this government has to start doing something. And Giannini continues: “In the coming months, Meloni must demonstrate that this government has clear priorities for this country, what economic policy it wants to adopt, what strategic sectors it wants to invest in, what it wants to do to combat poverty given that it has eliminated the basic income, and then the big European games. In other words, migrants, the reform of the stability pact (since we need to get out of this phase of austerity but frugal countries, especially Holland, don’t want to) and war, given that there is a need to increase supplies of arms to Ukraine”.

The international role
Alessandro Sergi asked how Italy stands in front of the great foreign powers. «Italy is important in the geostrategic balance of the planet, with its view on the Mediterranean – replies the director Giannini – Meloni has demonstrated a solid pro-European and Euro-Atlantic conviction. We are in a complicated phase: there is an attempt by Biden’s United States to recover a position of centrality in the new world order and Italy can only be a satellite of the great American galaxy. But there is also the dispute over the technological supremacy between the USA and China which the entire West carries with it. We must have an allied but independent foreign policy with respect to the United States. Europe is in a phase of total weakness. European leaderships are weak, Macron is in the minority in France and Scholz’s Germany is changing. Europe is disjointed”. The director recalls that Draghi’s leadership was tested, consolidated, strong, just think of the importance of the measure that fixes the price of gas, which was Draghi’s idea and which now allows us to have a 2021 price, than before of the beginning of the war. “But today we are in a situation of absolute weakness. All of Europe is weak in a world in constant and growing fibrillation”.

Bureaucracy, pensions, real problems
He has not yet received his pension, even if he turned 67 in April 2022: Pancrazio Dusnasio’s questions concern fundamental aspects of people’s lives. “The country needs profound changes,” says director Massimo Giannini. Social security, healthcare and the tax system are the fundamental issues to be resolved. “On the pension front, an overall reform is required, now that the 100 quota wanted by Salvini has expired, which cost 22 billion and has solved nothing”. Then health care: «The drama of the waiting lists – continues the director – of the besieged emergency rooms, of the missing doctors. Healthcare needs more investment: at the beginning of Covid we discovered that 37 billion had been cut in the sector in 10 years and we said “never again” to such a cut”. On taxation, the essential problem is tax evasion: «It is estimated at 170 billion a year. Six million people pay 30 million for groceries. Meloni says he will govern for five years: these problems will have to be tackled urgently, with serious and convincing measures ».

Finally, the electoral law. «The government speaks of presidentialism, differentiated autonomy and consequently of electoral law. I believe that nothing will be done about the first two. We need constitutional reforms, it will take at least two years of discussion. And I hope that in the meantime the electoral law will not be changed in the same spirit as in recent years, given that in recent years electoral laws have been made by majority vote, always to screw over whoever would come later. Now we have one of the worst electoral systems in Europe, with blocked lists and candidates chosen by the secretariats and without guarantee of governance».

The reverses of Meloni
Struck by the premier’s gyrations, Gianni Vincenzi wants to understand the government’s steps and about-turns. «The last week of the electoral campaign – says the director Giannini – Meloni had said “The free ride is over” and we all expected that she would start to deconstruct Europe against the policies of austerity, migrants and Pnrr. The first reverse was with the budget law, contrary to what Salvini asked, Meloni respected the budget balances and Europe approved and promoted the reform, compatible with the stability of our public budget. Second reverse on the anti-Rave decree, with an announcement of very heavy rules which were later eliminated in implementation. Third, the provisions on NGOs, which at the beginning recalled Salvini’s security decrees and then also thanks to the intervention of the Quirinale, those too have been mitigated. Fourth reverse, the most sensational, the one on the Pos, which winked at the electoral base of traders, VAT numbers, taxi drivers, and which was supposed to lift the sanctions but then skipped. Finally, fifth, the Pnrr, for which Meloni had said that he would renegotiate everything but then when Europe replied that it was not possible, he decided to negotiate on a different modulation of the calls for tenders according to the explosion of costs » . Giannini concludes: «Has Meloni changed his mind? Yes. Do many criticize you? Yes. I say: thank goodness he’s changing his mind.’