The social liberalism I believe in requires state intervention to ease the burden on households and businesses. That is a fundamental political difference with the government, Antonis Samaras says in a statement.
In detail:
High prices are not just the result of international developments. They are also a matter of government policy. The managerial, neoliberal Mitsotakis government is taking no measures to tackle inflation. Why? Because this allows it to generate excessive surpluses while also artificially reducing debt.
The social liberalism I believe in requires state intervention to ease the burden on households and businesses. That is a fundamental political difference.
So how can households and businesses get immediate relief? First of all, we are facing high energy prices today. And high taxes!
We can cut indirect taxes. On fuel — and more!
More than half of what you pay at the petrol station goes on fuel tax. You are not paying for “fuel” — you are paying tax on fuel. The European Union has set minimum levels of taxation on fuels.
We now have some of the highest taxes in Europe!
-- Take unleaded petrol. The EU minimum excise duty is 36 cents. Ours is 70 cents — almost double!
We have considerable scope to bring it down significantly.
-- Take VAT. The minimum rate on fuels is 15%. Ours is 24%. The same applies to diesel. So we have plenty of room to cut fuel taxes within EU limits, regardless of what is happening in the Persian Gulf.
Of course, we can also make a substantial cut in electricity prices.
But I am not talking only about cuts to energy costs.
We can cut VAT on other goods, too. For example, we can lower the top VAT rate from 24% to 23%, the level we had during our time in government. We can also cut VAT on a range of products from 24% to 13%.
For example, cut VAT to 13% for the food service sector!
It is an industry made up of hundreds of thousands of small and medium-sized businesses, and it is also part of the overall tourism offering.
Some people tell us this cannot be done. I tell you it can! I did it when we were in government. And back then we had bailout programmes — which we do not have now...
Back then we had deficits, whereas now we have huge surpluses! And at the time, the Troika disagreed, but we went ahead, and it turned out there was no problem with revenues. On the contrary, public revenues increased!
That is why I tell you: I did it in much worse conditions.
And it can be done again.