“The Bank of Portugal seems to be changing the effort rate so that more people can access credit, but the problem for each of us and the country is not the effort rates – it’s the price of houses and the embarrassing profits the bank collects.”said Paulo Raimundo.
Speaking at the Olhos da Fervença river beach in Cantanhede, Coimbra district, on Passeio das Mulheres CDU do Porto, the communist leader stressed that the big problem is low wages and pensions, which “cannot withstand these increases”. cheeky”.
The PCP leader stressed that it is not a question of “an effort percentage problem: it is a problem of low wages and pensions”.
“This is what needs to be solved and not messed around because that doesn’t solve any problem,” Paulo Raimundo stressed, referring to the fact that the country has to pay the bank “and the 10.7 million euros in profit per day” to pay increase. in benefits and rents”.
In his speech, the Communist General Secretary systematically repeated that the “fundamental and urgent” measure, which provides an answer to the decisive problems facing the Portuguese, is to raise wages and pensions.
“The situation is difficult and we know from experience the magnitude of the problem faced by thousands of people due to the brutal rise in housing costs,” he stressed.
According to Paulo Raimundo, Portugal is facing “a very serious situation, where thousands of people are literally tied up in their throats and trying to do everything possible and impossible to try and guarantee what is their greatest asset – housing”.
The PCP leader accused the government of not having a “concrete option” to deal with the problem of rising housing costs, stressing that “this is not about declarations of intent, but about concrete actions”.
“What we need at the moment is a government that is no longer the patron of banking interests and confronts the interests of the European Union and the European Central Bank in a decisive and decisive way,” he said.
As he had already done on Saturday, Paulo Raimundo challenged the Prime Minister to be consistent with his recent statements about the European Central Bank raising interest rates and to set prices for essential goods and services and to properly implement the PCP proposal. so that, as in the time of the pandemic, a moratorium on housing loans is put in place for a period of up to two years during which families only pay interest, at the rate at which banks finance themselves.
In addition to the proposed moratorium, the Secretary General of the PCP also believed that the state should play a central role in a mediated renegotiation of mortgage loans between individuals and banks, and for Caixa Geral de Depósitos a mandatory maximum spread of 0.25 should determine. %, “which had the benefit of dragging the rest of the bank into this solution”.
The leader stressed that the government has the “opportunity” to vote on these PCP proposals, which will be discussed in the Assembly of the Republic on Friday, and whose diploma also aims to reduce taxes on employees and pensioners, increasing the tax on economic groups. benefits through tax benefits and VAT reduction on electricity, gas and telecommunications.
Source: DN
