ROME (AFP) — The Italian Senate narrowly approved the 2008 budget Thursday, pulling the government of centre-left Prime Minister Romano Prodi back from the brink of collapse.
The spending bill passed, 161-157, with no abstentions.
Prodi, who attended the vote, hugged Economy Minister Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa as right-wing senators shouted "Shame, Shame!"
"Now I think the Cavaliere (Silvio) Berlusconi should say: 'I was wrong,'" said Prodi, referring to repeated predictions by his predecessor and opposition leader, nicknamed "the knight," that his government would collapse over the belt-tightening budget.
Already on Wednesday evening as the tide began turning in Prodi's favour, the conservative Berlusconi began back-pedalling.
The government "won't necessarily fall tomorrow or in the coming days, but it surely cannot last much longer," he said, charging that the administration had lost "all political and moral legitimacy."
Crucially, liberal leftist Senator Lamberto Dini, a former caretaker prime minister who had threatened to vote against the bill along with two of his allies, backed down, approving the budget, he said, out of a "sense of responsibility."
Dini's disposition was likely improved by the passage of an amendment, which he proposed, to eliminate a provision that would have automatically given permanent positions to thousands of civil servants on temporary contracts.
The 2008 budget targets a reduction of the public deficit to 2.2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) next year from 2.4 percent this year.
Italy was well outside the 3.0 percent limit of the European Stability Pact through most of Berlusconi's five-year rule.
Prodi, 68, was elected by a hair's breadth 18 months ago promising to root out political sleaze following Berlusconi's unprecedented full five-year tenure.
The former European Commission president earned praise for his ability to pull together more than a half-dozen parties into a multi-hued coalition, which stretches from communists to moderate Catholics.
But that same diversity dragged him down, as communists and Greens in his government led opposition on foreign policy issues, notably linked to US military operations.
Prodi came to power promising reforms but once he began spearheading them with higher taxes and spending cuts his popularity plummeted and grumblings grew within his coalition.
Nickamed "Il Professore", the mild-mannered former economics professor has faced mounting criticism since his cabinet approved the 2008 budget, the second consecutive austerity spending bill.
To coincide with the budget row, Berlusconi's Forza Italia party plans to stage three days of rallies across the country this weekend with the goal of collecting five million signatures on a petition calling for fresh elections.
But others on the right are not in a hurry for elections, preferring to wait for electoral reforms aiming to alleviate the endemic fragmentation of Italian politics.
An interim government is a possibility while a new electoral law is forged.
Marco Tarchi, a political science professor at Florence University, told AFP ahead of the budget vote: "If Prodi passes the test it will be a success since just a few weeks ago lots of observers were betting on his downfall. He'll have a respite of at least six months or more."
After the Senate vote, the spending bill goes to the lower house Chamber of Deputies, where Prodi has a comfortable majority.
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