It’s official: Italy’s new government gets final green light from senate

Italy's new government won a confidence vote in the upper house of parliament on Tuesday, the last hurdle to overcome before the pro-European executive could get down to work.

Published: 11 September 2019 09:36 CEST

It's official: Italy's new government gets final green light from senate

Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte with colleagues in the Senate. Photo: Filippo Monteforte/AFP

The coalition of the anti-establishment Five Star Movement and centre-left Democratic Party (PD), led by Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, won the support of 169 MPs, while 133 voted against and five abstained.

The government had easily won the same vote in the lower house, where Conte on Monday had presented his programme to applause from supporters and boos from the opposition. Tuesday's debate ahead of the vote was similarly charged, with cries of “Traitor!” from the far right.

Five Star (M5S) and the PD agreed to join forces after strongman Matteo Salvini pulled his anti-immigration League party from a coalition with the M5S in August, toppling the government. Salvini has accused the M5S and PD, which have long despised each other, of joining forces purely over their dislike for him and their fear of fresh elections.

“You are the minority in this country… You can run for a few months, but you cannot escape [elections] indefinitely,” he said. Salvini reached out to M5S supporters in particular who may feel betrayed by the Movement's alliance with the centre left.

Conte did not mention Salvini by name, but slammed the “arrogance” of the man who felled the previous government and demanded “full powers” — the exact words used by wartime dictator Benito Mussolini.

Photo: Andreas Solaro/AFP

'Not good enough'

The most pressing issue facing Rome will be the upcoming 2020 budget, a key test for relations with Brussels.

The prime minister on Monday called for the EU's Stability and Growth Pact, which limits budget deficits to 3 percent of gross domestic product in member states, to be “improved” and simplified. The pact was the main bone of contention between the European Commission and the previous coalition in heavily indebted Italy, which must submit a balanced budget to Brussels in the coming weeks.

Ratings agency Moody's said Monday it expects the new government to be less eurosceptic and have better relations with Brussels and fellow EU member states. Italy's former centre-left premier Paolo Gentiloni was handed the economy portfolio in the incoming European Commission on Tuesday.

The government is also facing calls to ease Salvini's hardline immigration rules, which ban charity ships that have rescued migrants from entering Italian waters. Conte called on Tuesday for “all political parties and citizens to avoid
obsessively concentrating on the slogans 'open the ports', 'close the ports'.”

The Ocean Viking ship, which is run by SOS Mediterranee and Doctors Without Borders, is stuck at sea, after appealing in vain for a safe port to disembark those it has saved. The Alan Kurdi, which had been asking to dock for ten days, was refused permission by Italy late on Monday, but given the go-ahead to disembark its five migrants in Malta on Tuesday after a deal with other European countries to take them in.

“The government's first act is closing the ports to the Alan Kurdi. This is not good enough, not at all,” PD lawmaker Matteo Orfini tweeted.

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The strike comes after Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama — who is close to Meloni — called a top RAI editor to complain about a television report into Italy’s controversial migration deal with his country.

The Usigrai trade union called the strike from May 6 to May 7 saying talks with management had failed to address their concerns.

It cited numerous issues, including staff shortages and contract issues, but in first place was “the suffocating control over journalistic work, with the attempt to reduce RAI to a megaphone for the government”.

It had already used that phrase to object to what critics say is the increasing influence over RAI by figures close to Prime Minister Meloni, who leads Italy’s most right-wing government since World War II.

However, another union of RAI journalists, Unirai, said they would not join what they called a “political” strike, defending the return to “pluralism” at the broadcaster.

Funded in part by a licence fee and with top managers long chosen by politicians, RAI’s independence has always been an issue of debate.

But the arrival in power of Meloni — leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy party, who formed a coalition with Matteo Salvini’s far-right League party and the late Silvio Berlusconi’s right-wing Forza Italia — redoubled concerns.

Tensions erupted at the weekend amid accusations RAI censored a speech by a leading writer criticising Meloni ahead of Liberation Day on April 25, when Italians mark the defeat of Fascism and the Nazis at the end of World War II.

Both RAI’s management and Meloni have denied censorship, and the premier posted the text of the monologue on her social media.

In another twist, Albania’s premier confirmed Thursday he called senior RAI editor Paolo Corsini about an TV report on Sunday into Italy’s plans to build two migration processing centres on Albanian territory.

Rama told La Stampa newspaper the report was “biased” and contained “lies” — adding that he had not raised the issue with Meloni.

The “Report” programme claimed the costs of migrant centres, which are under construction, were already “out of control” and raised questions about criminals benefiting from the project.