First payment could be made in February: rapprochements between opposition and government continue for financing PGU

Approaches continue with the government to find full financing and to guarantee resources that finance the Universal Guaranteed Pension (PGU) for the coming years. This was assured by the senator for the PPD, Ricardo Lagos Weber, who during the last day recognized the progress that negotiations with La Moneda have had to find new sources of financing for the bill, which must be discussed next week in the Senate.
According to the parliamentarian for the Valparaíso region, “there are extensive talks with the government, in order to ensure adequate financing for the Universal Guaranteed Pension (PGU) project. That project is good, necessary and fair, and hundreds of thousands of Chileans are waiting for it; however, the financing is clearly insufficient, and has been said by many institutions, economists and experts. What we have to do is approve fiscally responsible financing that responds to what the benefit requires,” he said.
In the opinion of Lagos Weber, “for that, you have to have a long look. It is not only about having the financing for the year 2022, which is already financed, it is about having secured financing for the future. We have made progress, and I think we are going to have to get more tax breaks, maybe introduce new taxes to get the right financing, but I am sure that if the government does its will, we will be able to approve it (the PGU project) in the next 15 days, and that will allow us to pay that benefit, within the next few weeks.”
From La Moneda the Minister of the Interior, Rodrigo Delgado, highlighted the work of his counterparts from the Treasury and the Segpres and even valued the work done with the elected President, Gabriel Boric. “Minister Cerda and Minister Ossa have done a great job of talking, of trying to reach agreements, of a pre-legislative work with Chile Vamos and also with the opposition, including the president-elect’s team, and we hope that these talks will come to fruition in the coming hours, but always focusing on the 2.2 million Chileans who expect their payment in February.”
It is worth mentioning that the opposition senators and the Boric team would already have in their hands a proposal from the Executive with new financing mechanisms, originated in the work they have been developing in recent weeks. According to El Mercurio, it also transpired that the initial analysis of the opposition is that “it is still insufficient” to guarantee the permanent financing of the measure “for around US $ 1,000 million”, so that the talks would continue during this weekend.
On the side of the Government, the Ministers of Finance, Rodrigo Cerda, and of the Segpres, Juan José Ossa, talk, while on the opposition the senators of the Finance Commission of the sector, plus the representatives of the president-elect Javiera Martínez and the deputy (RD) Miguel Crispi.
In recent days, some positions have been closed. Among them is, on the part of the Executive, not to support the tax on the “super-rich” approved in the Chamber of Deputies, while by the opposition highlights not giving the green light to the financing mechanism from the reduction of contributions to the Pension Reserve Fund (FRP).
But there were also openings regarding a surcharge for tranches to properties with a tax appraisal above $ 400 million and there would also be approaches in taxing mining patents that are not used and private investment funds (FIP) that are exempt from the first category tax. The replacement of VAT on services – except transport, health and education – and the elimination of the special VAT credit on construction for the social housing segment would be under discussion.
The RN deputy, Diego Schalper, had a harder analysis and pointed out that “part of the things that I think the moderation of President-elect Gabriel Boric has become aware of, is that he realizes that what he recently qualified as cooking, is part of representative democracy, which is to learn to talk with an opposition that will have half of the Senate, that it will have practically half of the Chamber of Deputies, and that it represents practically half of the country.”
“So what we have asked President Boric is to tell his coalition that it is not the minute of entor.Pecer a project that will allow the country to have the peace of mind that its pensioners have a Guaranteed Basic Pension at least above the poverty line,” Shalper added.
The RN deputy hopes with his caucus that in the 0.1% that is missing from GDP to finance the project, “let’s agree as soon as possible, that this does not pass January, because if it does not pass January we are in a position to pay pensioners since February, and that would be tremendous news for Chilean pensioners.”
“This project has a cost of 0.9 points of GDP, of those, half is guaranteed in the 2022 budget and in the provisions until 2026, as the Autonomous Fiscal Council made very clear. Another percentage has to do with the bill of exemptions, where we are having a legitimate parliamentary debate, that if it is projected, what the government is going to do is to put into immediate discussion the Universal Guaranteed Pension, so that at least it is paid during the year 2022, and we will have to prolong in the next Congress the discussion for the coming years. ” argued the parliamentarian of the current ruling party.
“Regarding the little that is missing, where the Autonomous Fiscal Council has made a question, regarding lowering the 0.1 of the reserve of solidarity pensions, there we are willing to dialogue,” Diego Shalper closed, pointing out that some proposals have been raised that have to do with increasing exemptions to other sectors and the mining royalty. In that sense, he said: “there are mechanisms, but believe me, a project that already has 90% agreement, cannot fail because of 10% disagreement.”

Original source in Spanish