GREEK MPs voted into force a new and deeply unpopular property tax last night, endorsing a drive to collect a further €2 billion in taxes that Prime Minister George Papandreou’s government says is essential to plug a major hole in the country’s budget.
All 154 members of the socialist Pasok parliamentary party and one independent endorsed the new law, which was opposed by all opposition parties, from conservative New Democracy to the Communists.
In an important concession announced before the open roll-call vote got under way shortly before 8pm, finance minister Evangelos Venizelos announced that hoteliers would be exempted from the tax.
Ahead of the vote, hundreds of demonstrators had already gathered outside the parliament building, which overlooks Athens’s Syntagma Square.
Apart from the protesters from the Indignant movement, which has maintained a regular presence on the square since late May, several hundred police demonstrators also gathered but behind a cordon surrounding the building manned by their on-duty colleagues in the riot police.
Earlier in the Greek capital, Mr Venizelos announced that he expected inspectors from the IMF/EU/ECB troika to return to Athens by the end of the week, admitting, however, this would be conditional on Greece providing written assurances showing that his government was totally committed to meeting its obligations.
The visit, and the new austerity measures, he added, would guarantee Greece receiving the next, sixth, tranche of its bailout loan, without which the country would effectively default by mid-October.
“The disbursement will take place and will take place on time,” he said.
During the press conference, Mr Venizelos detailed further austerity measures, including the sinking of the income tax threshold from €8,000 to €5,000 (to apply retroactively to 2011), pay cuts of up to 20 per cent for certain civil servants and the doubling of the cost of home-heating fuel.
He also increased the number of VAT receipts that taxpayers must collect to qualify for the full tax-free allowance, which has also been lowered. From next year, for example, someone earning €60,000 per annum must produce receipts worth €30,000 to ensure their €8,000 tax-free allowance.