Fiscal purification is a one-way street for the government, Minister of Finance Charilaos Stavrakis has said, urging all political parties to adopt a package of measures to boost public finances.
The Minister noted that technocrats at the Ministry of Finance are examining many scenarios, which will soon be submitted to the political parties for a decision.
He expressed the view that during the second semester of 2010 there will be a slight recovery of the Cypriot economy, which will be followed by an acceleration of the recovery in 2011.
“Public purification is a one-way street. All political parties should adopt an overall package of measures to achieve fiscal purification”, he said.
He added that the government has submitted a package of six measures, ''some of which are still before the House of Representatives, while two have been rejected''.
“Our effort focuses on dialogue with political parties to prepare a package of measures which will improve public finances”, he noted.
The Minister said that the government has taken out two loans with very favorable terms, one at a rate of 1.5% for six months and recently another loan at 1.7% for one year.
He recalled that Spain, ''a country with a higher credibility rate'', has taken a loan, a day after Cyprus, with a rate of 2.3% for one year, noting that ''this shows how professionally we handle public loans for the benefit of the Cypriot tax payer”.
“We believe that by the end of the year we will probably need one billion euro for the government needs and of course to re-finance current loans”, he said.
The Minister announced that the Council of Ministers during its meeting Tuesday approved a draft bill to regulate betting, which he described as ''a very important proposal which attempts to solve a problem, which has developed to a social blight during the past few years”.
''Since 2004 there has been an effort for better legislative control”, he said, adding that the draft bill will first be sent to the European Commission for discussion, because it is regulated by the European authorities, and then to the Cypriot Parliament for ratification.
