Govt bows to party pressure, agrees to rewrite budget

Premier Mario Monti's government has agreed to a substantial rewrite of the budget measures in its so-called Stability Law bill in the face of opposition from the main parties supporting the emergency administration. The biggest change is that a 1% cut in the two lower bands of income tax is to be scrapped to avoid an increase that would have taken the second-lowest bracket of VAT up from 10% to 11% next year. However, a 1% increase in the top band of VAT, taking it up to 21%, remains. The government will also scrap reductions in tax deductions for the current tax year, which would effectively have made this a retroactive measure, saying the reductions will now come into force in 2013. Ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom (PdL) party and the main centre-left Democratic Party (PD) said the agreement on changes to the bill was a step forward. The government said after presenting the bill, which also features a series of cuts hitting sectors including health and education, earlier this month that it was willing to accept some amendments during its passage through parliament as long as the bottom line is not affected. Business associations and consumers have joined many politicians in raised concerns that increasing VAT will further depress the Italian economy after austerity measures Monti's government passed last year deepened the recession Italy is enduring.