The government extends the beach concessions for a year. But the Quirinale could recall Meloni

Yesterday the Milleproroghe bill was approved in the Chamber, which among other deadlines has the current beach concessions were renewed by one yearuntil December 2024. Already in the evening, sources from the Quirinale announced that there is the possibility that Colle will accompany the signing of the text with a reminder note on this point: if this should be the case, it will then be up to the government of Giorgia Meloni to decide whether or not to accept the request.

The discussion on the possible postponement had been going on for weeks: only a month ago Europe, through a Commission spokesman, had urged Italy to put the concessions out to tender, based on the 2006 Bolkestein directive. pressures coming from BrusselsMattarella – who just yesterday met the president of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen in Palermo – would therefore have decided to add some remarks to the approval of the provision.

The risk for Italy, which has been under an infringement procedure since 2020 for the failure to liberalize concessions, is in fact to run into a rejection by the European Court of Justice, which will be expressed in the coming weeks with a sentence that appears to have a foregone conclusion. And from the moment of the pronouncement of the judges of Luxembourg, all the managers of the lidos risk becoming potential abusive. But not only: the danger is also that of exacerbating tensions with Europe, in such a delicate moment at an international level. A hypothesis that Colle wants to avoid in any way.

But it will not be easy to find an alternative solution. The deferral is indeed loudly defended by that part of the executive most attentive to the interests of the category: Forza Italia and Lega had not surprisingly approved an ad hoc amendment shortly before the vote in Lazio. Not later than yesterday, the Minister of Relations with Parliament Luca Ciriani (FdI) declared that “there are tens of thousands of small family-run businesses that are the backbone of our tourist offer, we cannot allow them to be swept away”. Claiming the extension that “serves to guarantee them immediately”. Not a small headache for the government, waiting to find out how the Quirinale will decide to move.