Greece voted tax and pension system reforms-Eurogroup ahead

Greece’s SYRIZA-ANEL party coalition will turn to the crucial meeting of euro zone finance ministers today in Bruseels, following the late-night approval in Athens of laws overhauling the country’s tax and pension system. A Euroworking group will take place earlier with the participation of Giorgos Chouliarakis.

Amid violence on the streets and a three-day general strike that had brought much of the country to a halt, the embattled government pushed the legislation through parliament with the backing of its 153 MPS. Addressing the 300-seat House, prime minister Alexis Tsipras said: “We are determined to make Greece stand on its two feet at any cost.”
Rioters pelted police with stones while black-clad anarchists lobbed flaming Molotov cocktail.

The controversial bills, worth €5.4bn in budget savings, were seen as the toughest reforms the thrice bailed-out nation has been forced to enact since its debt crisis began. The once firebrand Tsipras called the vote in advance of tortuous bailout negotiations being concluded in a bid to placate euro zone finance ministers ahead of Monday’s meeting.

But Greece’s most influential creditors, Germany and the International Monetary Fund, remain deadlocked over the terms of Greece’s bailout plan, which the IMF thinks is badly flawed but Germany says can’t be changed.

The Eurogroup, as the committee of eurozone finance ministers is known, will meet in Brussels on Monday to discuss Greece’s fiscal strategy and the sustainability of its debts. A resolution of the deep differences isn’t expected.

The legislation that Greek lawmakers passed late on Sunday covers the bulk of a package of austerity measures worth around €5.4 billion ($6.16 billion), or 3% of gross domestic product, that creditors have requested.

The legislation includes a simplification of Greece’s fragmented and costly pension system, which the country’s creditors and the ruling left-wing Syriza party agree is long overdue. But cuts to entitlements and increases in workers’ contributions have provoked opposition from Greek labor unions and other professional groups. Thousands of protesters demonstrated against the measures outside parliament on Sunday.