Alberto Núñez Feijóo, president of the Popular Party, has warned that the abrupt departure of the president of the INE from his position represents bad news for the credibility of the Government’s economic policy, already touched by the lack of success in the measures that it has put marching against the crisis.
“It is useless to question the statistics. The dismissal of the director of the INE is bad news for the credibility of Spain. It is something that had not occurred in 30 years. The GDP statistics are well done. and reaching this cessation because the Government does not agree with the official GDP statistics is an error that affects the credibility of the Kingdom of Spain”, he opined at the summer course organized by the Association of Self-Employed Workers (ATA) alluding to the head with which Spanish bonds are sold in the debt market.
The discomfort of the Government and specifically the Ministry of Economy with the publication of data from the National Institute of Statistics has been evident since last year. But the resignation a week ago of Israel Arroyo, Secretary of State for Social Security, uncovered what could be a maneuver to relieve the current president of the INE. It is this circumstance that has precipitated the departure of Juan Rodríguez Poo. Economy admits that “several profiles are being seen, so we are not talking about candidates: we hope to close the process in the coming weeks.”
Feijóo pointed out to the president of the CEOE, Antonio Garamendi, and the president of ATA, Lorenzo Amor, that all international organizations have “lowered the Government’s optimistic forecasts in the last three years” and stressed that “it is useless make inflated GDP or growth forecasts when they have to be revised every month”, alluding to the Vice President of the Government and head of the Economy, Nadia Calviño.
Garamendi has avoided going into the reasons for the resignation of the president of the INE but has underlined the importance of having independent bodies such as the INE itself, the Bank of Spain or the AIReF. “They must be independent, they are essential to evaluate things when you like them or when you don’t like them”, the INE has a lot of prestige and is very important to analyze the issues”.
“Seeing how the director of the INE is dismissed because the Government does not agree with the official statistics on economic growth and inflation is undoubtedly a mistake that affects the credibility, reliability and reputation of the Kingdom of Spain” , he pointed out, affirming that the INE statistics “are well done” and with the “appropriate methodology”, compatible with the one used by Eurostat.
If the statistics are correct, what is wrong is the course of the Government’s economic policy, Feijóo has indicated, noting that the Executive has been forced to draw up a second anti-crisis decree because the ideas of the first (Iberian exception in the price of electricity, subsidies for fuel consumption) have not worked.
In the opinion of the president of the PP, the Government must reduce personal income tax withholdings because with the increase in prices, collection in 2022 has skyrocketed “That the impact of inflation be returned to citizens and reactivate the private consumption”, he proposed, criticizing that the funds provided by the European Union to reactivate the economy are not reaching companies and people, but are being used to finance current state spending. He has also proposed temporarily abolishing or reducing the tax on hydrocarbons while the price of gasoline is above two euros.
“It is evident that our economic policy is not working. There are urgent decisions to be made and a series of measures are needed to get out of this situation” he concluded, mentioning the reduction of bureaucratic spending, the temporary reduction of taxes, a better execution of European funds and the implementation of medium-term structural reforms, something that the Government has not done “except for some counter-reform”, alluding to the labor reform approved last December in Congress.
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