Meloni at Confcommercio: “Taxes down for the middle class”

This is not the time for doubts, uncertainties and expectations. This is the time for action and the good news is that the time for action is also the time of Italy”. This is how Giorgia Meloni concludes her detailed speech at the annual meeting of Confcommercio. A speech lasting over thirty minutes in which the prime minister reviewed the most important results of the government’s action and anticipated the challenges to come, starting from the EU regulations that are about to arrive in the Council of Ministers on regulation of AIpassing through the Labor decree and the introduction of ‘fair salarythe tax reform with the tax cut which, said Meloni, remains a “government priority”, until the Housing Plan, “an important opportunity”, he also underlined to respond to the problem of the suburbs and sustainable urban development.

To the retail public, in particular, the Prime Minister sends a strong and reassuring message which, not surprisingly, touches on the ‘wild west’ problem of shops opening and closing shortly after, only to then reopen with other brands and without ever paying taxes: “the message we want to send is that this is not the banana republic. The rules are respected because without them there is no market and there is no growth”, he states, ensuring that the government “is responding” on this front too.

Thanking the Confcommercio audience, reciprocating their welcome underlined by applause at various points in the speech, the Prime Minister encouraged the representatives of the association to collaborate with the institutions “without hesitation” to contribute to the improvement of the country’s system and of Italians.

“No one can solve problems alone”

Meloni, who last year entrusted his greetings to the Assembly to a video message, this year, this time is in attendance and, he underlines, the first prime minister for 10 years now, begins by praising the essential role of the intermediate bodies and of Confcommercio, in particular, “one of the pillars of the Italian system, one of the most identifying and dynamic engines of our nation’s economy”. “We want to be the bearers of a policy that trusts the responsibility of intermediate bodies”, he underlines, asking for “an alliance to solve problems” because – admits Meloni – “no one can solve problems alone”. Then the attack against “those who abandon themselves to catastrophism or, worse, paint a situation that does not correspond to reality”, because “it is intellectually dishonest to paint Italy as a nation in which the problems have not been solved” and it is “equally dishonest – adds the Prime Minister – to necessarily have to downplay the encouraging picture that the macroeconomic data gives us”.

“Italy has brought out its character”

Addressing the assembly, Meloni criticized those who paint the country as “doomed” in the face of a macroeconomic framework which – he repeated on several occasions – has shown that it can resist” despite one of the worst economic situations in recent decades. Unlike a “certain narrative”, he notes, based on a “cosmic pessimism”, the country in reality, underlines Meloni, “has shown character”: Italy “not only resisted, but relaunched”, he remarked. Moreover, Meloni recalls the “record” data on employment but also the good growth rate of Italian exports and foreign investments as well as industrial production which – he states – “is starting to show signs of recovery”.

In his speech Meloni also clarifies the government’s position on the ongoing banking “risk”. A consolidation which, in his opinion, will have to guarantee family savings, strengthen credit and financial services to businesses”. After recalling the numerous interventions of the executive in favor of businesses and workers – from the renewal of contracts to the ‘fair wage’, from interventions on fuel, to supports for citizens’ purchasing power – Meloni dedicates a passage of his speech to the ongoing demographic emergency and to the support of female work, recalling that “children are not an obstacle to success”, especially with a view to “reversing the dramatic data on demographics”.

“Thanks to Pope Leo for the important reflection on AI”

Another emphasis, always thinking about the next measures to be adopted, is instead dedicated to the encyclical of Leo XIV and his “important reflection” on the impact of AI on human life. A challenge, says Meloni, that “must be governed at a global level”.