The parliamentary opposition proposes creating a loan guarantee fund of 2 billion lei for businesses in difficulty, namely for companies that experience massive reductions in sales owing to the halt in activity. The legislative proposal formulated by the Action and Solidarity Party wasn’t registered in Parliament in the hope that the Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Finance will undertake it through the Government’s platform so that it could be implemented faster, MP Radu Marian stated in a public debate entitled “Supporting business community: between economy and politics” that was held by IPN News Agency.
“We suggest creating a loan guarantee fund to the value of 2 billion lei, for example. We set down several conditions, namely that it should benefit the business entities with massive declines in sales, which were banned from working during the state of emergency. This bill that we announced today is designed for companies that are really in need. We discussed with banks and with the Ministry of Economy that is managed by a representative of the PDM. We hope that this measure will be undertaken. We didn’t register this bill in the hope that the Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Finance will undertake the provisions we drafted and will register them as a legislative proposal of the Government so as to save time. This is our approach. We want to come up with ideas and the Government should take good decisions. This alternative as regards the creation of a guarantee fund will be much more suitable for helping business entities instead of simply subsidizing interest rates. We didn’t see something like this in other countries,” noted the MP.
He said that this proposal will help avoid bankruptcies, layoffs and an explosion in unemployment. If the bill is implemented, more jobs will be kept, the viability of companies will be strengthened and their path to recovery will be shorter, unlike some of the already adopted measures.
“There is a measure that does not help the business entities that are unable to pay salaries, like those of the hospitality industry. Without economic activity, you do not have incomes and cannot pay salaries to employees and cannot get back a part or all the contributions paid into the state budget. This is again a measure that can benefit the companies in a better situation, which pay salaries and will also get back the paid contributions. The state allocates this money that we fear will benefit those that do not really need it. It is a waste of money on companies that do not need it. An alternative is to follow the model of many other European states. According to our analysis, 80% of the countries in Europe implemented the partial subsidization of salaries at companies that do not perform economic activities. In other words, you inject money into a company and the company, for its part, partially or fully pays the salary to the employee,” noted Radu Marian.
The debate “Supporting business community: between economy and politics” was the 130th installment of the series of debates “Developing political culture through public debates” that are supported by the Hanns Seidel Foundation.