Italy:
EU's best paid lawmakers asked to cut own salary
Tuesday, 31 January 2012
last update: January 31, 12:43
Rome, 31 Jan. (AKI) - Italy's emergency government has asked the country's politicians to cut their own salaries - the highest in the European Union.
Prime minister Mario Monti's government late Monday said that a decree was sent to the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate to trim their pay as part of a broader effort to put Italy's financial house in order.
Monti and a team of non-professional politicians took over from Silvio Berlusconi's government in November as borrowing costs for the European Union's fourth-richest country spiralled to worrisome levels increasing the likelihood that Italy would have trouble paying interest on its 1.9 trillion euro-debt load. The very future of the euro currency would be put at risk should Italy not be able to pay its bills.
Monti has pushed through measures that raise taxes and require Italians to work longer before retiring. The austerity packages have created outrage prompting Italians to demand that their pampered political class make sacrifices as well.
Italy's 950 lawmakers will have to make due with a gross cut totalling 1,300 euros. Their average monthly salary of 16,000 euros makes them the top earners among lawmakers in the European Union, according to a government commission report released in December.
The basic salary of an Italian politician is 149,215 euros annually, double the salaries of the Germans and the British, three times the salary of the Portuguese, and four times that of the Spanish, according to data collected by the BBC.
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