Senate bill mustn't be 'turned on head'

(ANSA) - Rome, July 24 - Reform Minister Maria Elena Boschi said Thursday that the government's bill to revamp the Senate can be amended but must not be "turned on its head". "The government is always willing to improve the text," she said of the bill, whose first passage through the Senate has been badly hit by obstructionism from opposition groups. Boschi blasted the obstructionism, which means that only a handful of the almost 8,000 amendments to the bill have so far been voted on, as damaging.
    "We'll keep going. It's not serious to conduct obstructionism in this way. It affects the dignity of this institution," she said.
    The government is aiming to complete the bill's first passage in the Senate before parliament's summer recess next month.