PNRR/Orban: PSD experts had access to documents; heard a lot of nonsense from Opposition

Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies Ludovic Orban declared on Wednesday, that the Social Democratic Party (PSD) experts had access to the "main" documents of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR). "I would like to provide the media with the correct information according to which, at the level of the Ministry of European Funds, the experts who were delegated by the PSD to examine the PNRR and who actually saw the main documents of PNRR, practically had access to these documents. The PSD's request, that you can follow from the previous requests, was to debate the PNRR in Parliament," Orban stated in Parliament. He specified that the Government had announced that, after submitting the PNRR, this will be made public. "It is known that this plan is in a continuous negotiation between the Romanian Government and the European Commission, the experts of the European Commission and that its presentation, let me say this, in a semi-finished form, is made when it is being submitted to the European Commission. There are always corrections to be made until the plan is submitted and, in practice, these negotiations have been negotiations that have involved a permanent update, an adaptation to the points of view of the experts," the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies maintained. Ludovic Orban reiterated that there are no requests from the European Commission regarding certain measures. "From the European Commission's point of view there aren't any requests regarding certain measures that need to be taken. I've heard so much nonsense today from the Opposition. I did not wish to reply, because I considered the ratification of EURATOM to be more important, but I cannot hold back. The Commission does not give us homework, it does not urge us. There are certain matters here related to the fact that Romania is under a procedure of excessive deficit, which was initiated as a result of 2019's deficit and that there is a plan of gradual recovery within the accepted deficit through the EU treaty of 3% of the GDP and the European Commission is preoccupied, with the start of utilizing loans that are being calculated, adding to the public deficit and the public debt, for that recovery plan below 3% not to be affected. I will give you an example: they are interested in the sustainability of public wages," Orban explained. He also said that the PNRR will include all the reforms when it is sent to Brussels. AGERPRES(RO - author: Florentina Peia, editor: Claudia Stanescu; EN - author: Catalin Cristian Trandafir, editor: Simona Iacob)