Italy’s Senate rushed to pass debt- reduction measures that clear the way for establishing a new government that may be led by former European Union Competition Commissioner Mario Monti in a bid to restore confidence in Europe’s second-biggest debtor.
The Senate is set to vote tomorrow on a package of measures including asset sales and an increase in the retirement age. The Chamber of Deputies may vote the following day, and Prime MinisterSilvio Berlusconi will resign “immediately,” Angelino Alfano, the secretary of Berlusconi’s People of Liberty party, said on state-owned Rai television last night.
President Giorgio Napolitano named Monti yesterday as a Senator for Life, an honorary position that allows him to vote in the upper house of parliament. Alfano, when asked if Monti would lead the government, said Berlusconi had backed his Senate appointment and had first named Monti as an EU commissioner in 1994. Monti may be nominated as soon as Nov. 13, newspaper Il Sole 24 Ore reported. Former Prime Minister Giuliano Amato may also be in the government, Sole said, citing no one.
