Greece’s lenders, the Troika rejected two of Greek government plans: the tax reduction in heating oil and the broadening of income criteria for those entitled to heating oil allowance. The government had proposed to decrease at 15% the Special Consumption Tax for heating oil and avoid the freezing of Greek households and the incredible air pollution of last winter.
However the Troika answered with a clear and double “No!”
The government proposal foresaw:
– 25% advance payment of heating oil allowance
– Increasing the subsidy to 0.35 euros per liter (from 0.28 euro)
– Widening the income and assets criteria for those entitled to heating oil allowance
While we, Greeks, are preparing psychologically for another freezing winter without heating, temperatures rose this weekend, reaching even 30 degrees Celsius.
PS time for a good swim in the open sea to harden our bodies for the upcoming cold disaster…
Wasn’t it the Greek government itself that thought up and introduced this ‘fine’ tax last year itself? I think I even remember some reports of Troika officials uttering some concern about it? But I might be wrong about the last.
What is clear though that Greek politics is still up to their old dirty tricks at the expense of the Greek people. It’s like what they did for decades with the budget deficits. They used every trick in the book to inflate the deficits just after elections to blame former governments and then could announce THEY were the once to bring it down. G. Papandreou got burned by that trick big time as we now all know… and feel.
So, first putting a total crazy levy on heating oil to ‘combat fraud’, because they found it to difficult or politically costly to just apply the laws of the land. And now trying to play ‘good cop’ by reducing trying to reduce the levy, which incomes were just used to stop some gaps in the budget and not providing new funds for preventing new gaps. It’s exactly the same trick they did the last 12 months with VAT on restaurants…
And everybody here is falling for it… again…
you know it’s the old game: gov’t blames the Troika, and vice versa. Troika wants XXX revenues and leaves it up to the gov’t to decide how and form where these revenues come. the rest is statements and blames to pass the time and show the gov’t tries for the benefit of the people but the Troika doesn’t allow.