Prime Minister António Costa said today that Portugal can face next year with "confidence and without fear," after Brussels decided not to submit a proposal for the suspension of EU funds and gave the 2017 Budget a green light.
Costa was speaking to journalists in Casablanca, having heard the European Commission had decided that due to the "effective action" carried out by Portugal’s government, the excessive deficit procedure should be suspended and the country should hit the budget deficit target of under 3% this year.
The European Commission also said it believed that the risks of Portugal defaulting on its loan repayments, which had been identified in the Portuguese fiscal plan for 2017, "will not materialise" and welcomed yesterday’s positive data on economic growth in the third quarter.
"We can only be optimistic about 2017 and about the signal that this represents in terms of confidence in Portuguese public finances," said the prime minister.
"Portuguese companies can look with confidence at the financing conditions and the country can look with confidence and calm regarding its relationship with European institutions," he said.
The prime minister believes that the country "can only be optimistic about 2017."
"So today there is good reason to be satisfied. If you asked me if I am more satisfied today than I was a year ago, I would say ‘yes.’ We took a full year talking about Plan Bs and that things were going to fail. Those year-end negative scenarios have not been confirmed," he concluded.
