Greek government seeks confidence vote ahead of Eurogroup meeting

Athens, 10 February 2015 (MIA) - Greece’s leftist-led coalition government, which has vowed to overturn a series of austerity measures that were a condition of its international bailout, will seek a confidence vote in parliament on Tuesday - two weeks after it was elected to power.

The ruling SYRIZA government which has a 162-seat majority in the 300-seat parliament together with his junior coalition partner, the small right-wing Independent Greeks, is expected to have no trouble winning the confidence vote, scheduled for midnight, German news agency dpa reports.

The vote comes less than 24-hours ahead of a crucial emergency meeting of Eurozone finance ministers meeting on Wednesday on Greece’s financing needs.

The plans by the Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras to end budget cuts and tax increases as part of its conditions for continued bailout aid have put it on a collision course with its European partners.

Senior Greek finance ministry sources said the government plans to attend the Eurogroup summit with a proposal for a bridge programme to cover the government’s funding needs until it can negotiate a replacement for its bailout programme with creditors which would come into force in September.

The government’s proposal is in four parts, according to the finance ministry source. The first foresees keeping in place 70 per cent of the bailout conditions while 30 per cent of the memorandum would be scrapped and replaced with 10 new reforms which Greek officials are to agree with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

The second proposal says Greece’s primary surplus target of 3 per cent of GDP for this year should be reduced to 1.5 per cent. The third proposal outlines the Greek government’s desire to reduce the country’s debt through a swap plan.

Finally, the government wants the country’s humanitarian problems to be eased using measures outlined in the government’s policy programme, which include gradually increasing the minimum wage and pensions and putting an end to tax increases. At the same time it has vowed to crack down on corruption and tax evasion.

As regards financing, ministry sources said Greece wants to secure the 1.9 billion euros in profits the European Central Bank made on the holdings of Greek bonds, and have the right to issue about 8 billion euros of additional short-term debt or T-bills above the 15-billion-euro limit which Athens has exceeded.

The government is also keen to raise the threshold for emergency liquidity assistance from the European Central Bank.

Another proposal foresees using the 11 billion euros in leftover funding from the recapitalization of Greek banks to help local lenders deal with non-performing loans.

The government could also access remaining bailout disbursement of 7 billion euros if required, sources said, reversing the previous decision by the government that it does not want the money.