Mário Draghi, President of the Central European Bank
ECB says this delay is "surprising"
in the case of Portugal and Croatia,
as these countries have promised
an "ambitious reform agenda"
Portugal and Croatia are being censored
by the European Central Bank (ECB)
because they have made "insufficient" progress
in meeting the Specific recommendations
for structural reforms in 2016.
Turning the results of the evaluations
(originally conducted by the European Commission)
on a scale of 0% to 100%,
Portugal gets a negative rating:
the final score is around 35%
and below the euro area average (37% ).
The biggest compliant, it is noteworthy,
are countries like Estonia, Ireland and Finland,
(all three with 50%).
Yesterday, in an article in the economic bulletin,
the ECB makes its own assessment
and comment on the efforts of the countries
and governments of the European Union
on structural reforms within the framework
of the European Semester.
The first version of this assessment ("winter package")
was published last February 22.
The scores fall into five groups of measures
and are divided into five levels:
"no progress", "limited progress", "some progress",
"substantial progress" and "overall progress".
The ECB is somewhat shocked that "vulnerable" countries
have relaxed in the reform effort in 2016.
Portugal is one of them.
"In general, EU member states have taken insufficient measures
to implement reforms in response
to the country-specific recommendations
made in 2016," the ECB said.
"The European Commission concluded
that the overwhelming majority - more than 90% -
of the reform recommendations was followed
by only a few or few progress in implementation,
while only two sets of recommendations
(out of a total of 90)
were substantially implemented."
It happened in France and Belgium,
in terms of salary recommendations.
The ECB regrets that "no" group of measures
have been "fully implemented" in Europe.
"This weak reform momentum contrasts with
the realization that the number of countries
with excessive imbalances has not declined,"
the central bank says.
For Frankfurt, "despite the greater vulnerability,
the six countries identified last year
as having excessive imbalances
[Portugal, Cyprus, France, Bulgaria, Italy and Croatia]
were not able to average significantly
more than France, Highly "compared to the EU average.
For the ECB, "this is particularly surprising
in the case of Portugal and Croatia,
as these countries committed
to an ambitious reform agenda in 2016"
and that is why "the Commission decided
not to apply the procedure due to excessive imbalances ".
The country-specific recommendations
are divided into five groups.
The first has to do with what has been done in public accounts,
deficit, debt, employee spending, pensions,
health and public enterprises.
Here national progress has been "limited"
Europe evaluates all this separately
and at this stage of the European semester
does not decide whether or not countries
are complying with the Stability Pact.
This will be released in the spring; In May.
The second group has to do with the progress of wages,
namely the minimum.
Note from Portugal "limited".
The third set of recommendations measures
effectiveness in combating unemployment.
In this the country had "some" advances.
The fourth set concerns the stability of the banks
and the specific problems of bad loans and SME credit.
Progress has been "limited".
The fifth group addresses the issue
of public-private partnerships
and market and competition distortions.
Here, the country also had "some" advances
in the requested reforms.
António Costa and Mário Centeno,
promised the world,
the best reforms on earth,
the most ambitious,
nothing but the BEST!
But they have miserably FAILED to comply!
35% is a Failure!!
The illusions are finally falling apart!!
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