Premier Matteo Renzi said Friday
the time when the EU ordered Italy about by remote control was
over. Speaking on TG5, he said amid a spat with European
Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker that "Italy has
completed reforms and therefore the time in which they could
remote control policies from Brussels to Rome is over". He said
"the time when we used to go cap in hand is over". Renzi said
that budget flexibility was only introduced by the EU "after
Italy asked for it in a very very very insistent way". He added:
"Flexibility means common sense, having an economic policy that
thinks more about employment and less about austerity and
iron-clad budget rules". The premier was speaking amid an
unusually sharp exchange with Juncker, who had chided Renzi for
criticising the EC. Renzi also vowed to come down with "an iron
fist" on slackers in the civil service, and to fire those guilty
of chronic absenteeism.
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