August 10, 2014 5:04 pm

Matteo Renzi defends pace of Italian reform

By Rachel Sanderson in Rome

Matteo Renzi, Italy’s prime minister, says the eurozone’s third-largest economy is on track to hit its EU-mandated budget targets this year despite falling back into recession in the second quarter and, in a pugnacious interview with the Financial Times, defended the speed at which his reforms are moving.

Mr Renzi, speaking in the prime minister’s office in Rome, rejected suggestions made by European Central Bank president Mario Draghi last week that the EU should intervene in countries where reforms were not being implemented fast enough to spur economic growth.

“I agree with Draghi when he says that Italy needs to make reforms but how we are going to do them I will decide, not the Troika, not the ECB, not the European Commission,” he said. “I will do the reforms myself because Italy does not need someone else to explain what to do.”

On Wednesday it was revealed that Italy unexpectedly fell back into recession in the second quarter for the third time since 2008. The economy shrank 0.2 per cent quarter-on-quarter between April and June, after contracting 0.1 per cent in the first three months of the year, having only briefly emerged from two years of recession at the end of 2013.

Economists have said the fall in gross domestic product may result in the general government budget deficit breaching the EU’s 3 per cent of GDP threshold for 2014. Fabio Fois, an economist at Barclays in Milan, expects the deficit will pass the 3 per cent limit unless the government cuts spending by between €1.2bn and €3.2bn.

Mr Renzi, who took power in a party coup in February and whose centre-left democratic party won a landslide victory in the European elections in May with an unprecedented 40 per cent of the vote, vowed to take personal control of Italy’s ongoing spending review to ensure compliance with the EU targets.

“I have absolutely no intention of breaking the 3 per cent ceiling. We hope to have better [growth] figures in the second half and as a result will be at 2.9 per cent [of GDP]. We will not break 3 per cent, it is an old rule, but it is still a matter of credibility and of reputation for Italy even if others will surpass it,” he said.

The 39-year-old former mayor of Florence appeared to backtrack on previous demands for the EU to introduce more flexibility to its budget rules, but admitted feeling worried about potential deflation in the eurozone.

“I’m not a fearful person by nature . . . but it would make me happy if the euro weren’t as strong against the dollar and if inflation were a bit higher,” he said.

Mr Renzi, who has just won parliament’s first approval for a landmark reform of Italy’s Senate, defended his decision to give priority to the Senate overhaul – which ultimately will see the end of Italy’s two-chamber system and slashes the number of senators to 100 from 320 – over labour reform and tax cuts as “absolutely the most important [reform] to achieve because it was the most difficult”.

On a day when national airline Alitalia signed a deal allowing Emirates-owned Etihad to become its largest shareholder, Mr Renzi added he was “flinging wide open the doors” of Italy to foreign investors and cited upcoming investments by Chinese, Indian and US investors in Italian assets.

“We are going to bring this country out of the crisis, Italy has a great future, Italian finances are under control, we will continue to lower taxes, we will do revolutionary things . . . Not even dictators managed to get things done as fast as this,” he said.