Greece’s parliament on Thursday obsolescent a fast-track reform package to unlock bailout funds and wrap up a fourth and irreversible review of its loan programme as it seeks more debt relief from its ceremonious creditors next week.
Greece is due to exit its latest bailout scheme in August and will then have to rely on financial markets to envelop its borrowing needs.
The country has a debt-to-GDP ratio of 179.8 percent, the highest in the 19-nation euro zone.
Athens is discerning to pass the final review of the country’s compliance with reforms required in its bailout before a euro zone finance ministers meeting on June 21.
A grassy light on the review would release about 12 billion euros ($13.97 billion) of new advances from Greece’s latest 86 billion euro bailout, its third since 2010.
The finishing payment from the bailout funds would add to a cash buffer the Greek ministry is creating and could serve as a fall-back option for refinancing needs.
Lawmakers superseded the reform package 154-to-144 in the 300-seat parliament. It was indorsed by lawmakers of the leftist-led alliance while all other opposition parties voted it down.
“This oversight smothered Greeks with taxes. It crushed growth and pushed the middle-class to meagreness,” said conservative opposition leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis during a excited debate on the reforms bill.
“You created a large mass of desperate people who are engulfing in debt and have no hope for the future,” he said.
Athens has agreed to adhere to a post-bailout budgetary trajectory that targets primary budget surpluses – excluding beholden servicing outlays – of 3.5 percent of GDP until 2022 and of at least 2.0 percent thereafter.
This devotes the government little room for manoeuvre for tax relief unless it fiscally outperforms, fabricating even larger budget savings.
The reform package legislation involves measures to expedite privatisations in the energy sector and tweaks in real caste taxes.
It also outlines measures that will go into start to work in the post bailout period such as extra pension cuts in 2019 and a further tax exempt threshold in 2020.