The parties are asking for sacrifices from the citizens, but no one has asked the parties for sacrifices. Don’t ask yourself what the party can do for you, but what you can give with your taxes to the party. Politics is the only unproductive sector that has a turnover that is continually growing. In 1993, public financing to the parties was abrogated in a referendum with 90.3% of the votes. But can a party live without money? The parties that enjoy the advantage of occupying Parliament, have made laws over the years that have repaired the referendum. All together in chorus, without ideological distinctions in the name of the fork, the true symbol of Parliament. The word “financing” is substituted with the much more elegant term “reimbursement” to put the citizens off the track. In 1999 the law 157/1999 brought in funds for elections to the Lower and Upper Houses, the European Parliament and to the regions with an overall maximum of 193,713,000 in annual chunks per legislature. In the case of early elections the “reimbursements” are interrupted.
The parties however, have expenses that we humans cannot even imagine and they modify the 2002 regulation with the law 156/2002 that brings the amount of prize money for Parliament to 468,853,675 euro and reduced by 1% (from 4%) the quorum needed to get a “reimbursement”. The parties, whose most well developed organ has always been the stomach, do not stop here.
In 2006, the law 51/2006 introduced the double “reimbursement” in the case of early elections. The “reimbursement” is valid for every one of the five years of the legislature, even if it is interrupted, and it is cumulative with the “reimbursement” for the following legislature. For the political elections in 2008 the PDL earned the right to 206,518,945 euro, the PDminusL 180,418,043, the Lega 41,384,550 and on and on stealing from us all the other parties as well (every “reimbursement” is added to the residue of the 2006 elections, thus about half). The cost of the parties, excluding the salaries to the various elected people, is close to the sum of a billion euro if you add the “reimbursements” for the current legislature, the part of the previous one that was given retribution anyway, the European elections and the regional elections.
The 5 Star MoVement has participated in the Regional elections. It obtained 500,000 votes in 5 Regions. It was self-financed with 40,000 euro. Each vote cost 0.08 euro. It refused 1,700,000 euro for election “reimbursement”. It has demonstrated that you can do politics without stealing from the citizens. Before asking for sacrifices, the parties that are aiming to gain, let them renounce the electoral “reimbursements”, otherwise, but it is just a euphemism, let them FxxK off!