Confidence vote threatens Italian government

• The Italian government was in danger of collapsing on Thursday, as the Five Star Movement decided to abstain on a vote of confidence.
• The decision of Five Star, an anti-establishment party, could lead to the breakdown of an already shaky coalition and potentially to early national elections.

ROME: The Italian government was in danger of collapsing on Thursday, as the Five Star Movement, a coalition partner of Mario Draghi, decided to abstain on a vote of confidence.

The decision of Five Star, a historically anti-establishment party that has tumbled in the polls and lost legislators, to walk out during the vote of confidence might lead to the breakdown of an already shaky coalition and potentially to early national elections later this year.

Five Star leader Giuseppe Conte, a former premier, said his party’s senators would walk out on a vote on a 23 billion euro assistance package.

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The package also has a part that allows a waste incinerator to be built in Rome, which is something the Five Star Movement has been against for a long time.

Draghi has said many times that there will be no government without the Five Star Party. He has done this to ease coalition tensions.

Following Senate deliberation, the motion of confidence is expected around noon.

Professor Lorenzo Codogno of the London School of Economics told AFP, “If the (Five Star senators) walk out of the chamber today, even if the government has the necessary votes, a new political phase opens.”

“Draghi would have no choice but to resign.”

On Thursday morning, jittery investors increased the difference between Italian and German bonds to 221 basis points on Milan’s Borsa.

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