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The core cabinet will meet again this afternoon to discuss the budget and measures to tackle the high energy prices. Rising energy costs are pushing the left-wing parties even harder on the budget discussion in the federal government. The 2 billion euros that Prime Minister Alexander De Croo (Open VLD) wants to save collide with a socialist veto.
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Prime Minister De Croo hoped to work out a restart and transition plan for our country during the budget conclave this weekend. But that intention is overshadowed by the political debate on energy prices. The annual bill for a household with an average electricity consumption has risen above 1,000 euros, the natural gas bill even exceeds 1,600 euros. Electricity has not been this expensive in three years, the price of gas is the highest in ten years. The top ministers hope to cut the knot on Sunday afternoon on measures to slow down that increase. They couldn’t figure it out on Friday evening and Saturday afternoon. It is also not certain whether this will work today.
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On the left, the rising energy bill is used to further temper the already limited savings ambitions. ‘After the covid and flood crises, we now have a third energy crisis. It is not the time to cut,” said a socialist cabinet on Friday. The budget deficit for next year is estimated at 21.3 billion euros or 4.14 percent of gross domestic product (GDP). De Croo aims for a budgetary effort of 2 billion euros, or 0.4 percent of GDP, but there is still no consensus on that figure.
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The essence
- The federal government wants to take measures to mitigate the rising energy bill.
- Prime Minister De Croo wants to save 2 billion euros, but the socialists are using the ‘energy crisis’ to temper their budget ambitions.
- There are mainly savings on the table that do not hurt much.
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All parties agree that ‘something’ must be done to reduce energy bills. Over the past week, a whole series of balloons have been released. The Greens and the Socialists are pushing for an extension of the extended social tariff for energy. Since this year, about a million families have been covered by this reduced rate, twice as many as in pre-corona times. The proposal is to keep this arrangement next year, which will cost 200 million euros.
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