Antonio Costa says it would be irresponsible for the country to spend everything now without worrying about the future.

This Saturday, the PS Secretary General defended the need for Portugal to create a post-2026 investment fund based on a budget surplus and warned that it would be irresponsible for the country to spend everything it has now.

This position was expressed by António Costa in his speech at the opening of the meeting of the PS National Commission, which takes place at the Lisbon International Fair (FIL), during which he spoke about the main objectives of the government’s proposal for the state budget. for 2024, the general debate of which will begin on Monday in the Assembly of the Republic.

“We all recognize that the Plan for Recovery and Resilience (PRR) was of an extraordinary nature, warranted by the exceptional circumstances surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic, and that we are not guaranteed to receive extraordinary reinforcement in the next cycle of public funds. .. these resources. Not only more life beyond the budget, but more life after 2026,” he said.

Together with the Minister of Finance Fernando Medina, after listening to his speech, António Costa considered it necessary to “ensure that the country continues to be able to invest after 2026”, and for this purpose a fund was created in which “a part of the balance of the 2023 budget is allocated”.

“Yes, we could spend it all now, but that would be irresponsible for the future because the country would need to maintain a strong public investment trajectory. And since we don’t know tomorrow, we need to create reserves today so that tomorrow we can continue to increase public investment,” he said.

While continuing to defend his government’s fiscal strategy, the Prime Minister once again sought to highlight the instability of the current international situation, arguing that economically and financially the country “must rely on its own strength” – here, in a reference to measures to stimulate domestic consumption , such as salary increases for civil servants and pensioners in 2024, as well as a projected IRS cut of approximately 1,500 million euros next year.

“Having the right accounts means gaining the freedom to do what you need to do when you really need to do it. It also means we don’t spend everything we can spend when we can’t spend everything we can spend,” he said. .

For António Costa, a fiscal surplus is important because it “generates the savings the country needs to invest after 2026, strengthens the government’s social security system and saves on debt servicing.”

“Without this debt reduction we would have paid €2.6 billion in interest next year – an amount we could use to strengthen investment in the National Health Service (SNS), public schools and tax refunds to citizens,” he said . stated.

In his speech, the PS Secretary General confirmed the thesis that the problem of the SNA is not in financing, which, according to him, increased from eight billion to 15 billion between 2015 and 2023, by about 72%, but in management.

For this reason, in his view, his government is “reforming” the system by creating community health facilities, generalizing Model B of family health facilities, and creating better incentives for remuneration of health sector professionals, especially doctors, with the expansion of the exclusive dedication regime.

He then left the thorn to the sides to the left of the PS.

“It is necessary to ensure that the efforts made by the Portuguese to increase the SNS budget by 72% through taxes lead to an improvement that is perceived and felt by everyone in the health sector. For us, SNS is not a slogan, it was the PS that created and defended SNS. And it is the PS that reforms the SNA to protect and guarantee its future,” he said.

In addition to the issue of the SNA, in his speech the Secretary General of the PS said that from Sunday the implementation of the reform that followed the closure of the Service for Foreigners and Borders (SEF) will be carried out locally.

At this point, António Costa said that the border control functions from a security point of view are the responsibility of the PSP and GNR; the reception of refugees and migrants will be based on “social and humanitarian response”; and the criminal investigation will be concentrated in the judicial police.