Financiarul

Prime Minister Emil Boc told Thursday’s debates on the social security budget that it is imperative that the budget should be approved under the form proposed by the executive in order for the pensions and wages to be paid.

Boc stressed this is a budget that meets the demands of emerging out of the downturn and he added that in case there is economic growth, the minimum pensions could be index-linked.
‘This is a budget that meets the demands of emerging out of the downturn and of laying the groundwork for the country’s economic strengthening. We have agreed with all our partners, based on the existing data in 2010, that we are going to have 1.3 percent economic growth and we’ll no longer have the economic drop of 2009.

We must be careful in order to ensure this sound growth and if things go to this direction, we’ll be able to afford to index-link the minimum welfare pension in the beginning of 2010….
We have the required framework to index-link the minimum welfare pension to the inflation rate, the agreement with the IMF also allows us to do this. It is a real and realistic thing that can be done.

And if the economy, in the second part of the year, offers us additional financial resources, I want to assure you I’ll be the first to come before you and ask for the legislative support to index-link the remainder of the pensions too, starting with the low ones. This is what we can realistically do. We have no resources to do more at this moment’, the premier said.

Boc also came with some clarifications referring to the social security budget bill, especially on the topic connected to the payment of wages and of pensions in 2010, being keen to remind the MPs their declaration of Nov. 4, 2009 on the Parliament’s firm commitment to observe the obligations and macro-economic indicators, as established through the Stand-by agreement concluded by Romania with the International Monetary Fund.

“Romania’s Parliament expressed its full commitment and full support for the observance of the macro-economic indicators level, as they were stipulated by the agreement with IMF and which must form the basis for the future state budget law on 2010.
Romania could leave the economic crisis behind only under these conditions, a crisis it is facing now, and also could affirm its status as a credible partner for the international bodies. (…) There is a Romania’s Parliament pledge, assumed beyond the political parties it is formed of, for the observance of these commitments (…)”, Boc said.

At the same time, he reminded the MPs the Government’s Emergency Ordinance of 22 September for the ratification of the Stand-by agreement between Romania, IMF and the other structures with which Romania concluded agreements. He noted that the agreement, in the Senate’s ongoing debates, contains all the technical and political details of Romania’s pledge.