Portuguese Socialist MP Miguel Costa Matos announced today that the Socialists will abstain from voting on most of the proposed amendments to the 2026 State Budget in order not to compromise the balance of public accounts.
In a speech on what is the first day of the specialised debate on the proposed State Budget for next year, Miguel Costa Matos said that “the Socialist Party is a responsible party and will fulfill its responsibilities”.
He added that the PS parliamentary group “did not present any amendment proposals that would jeopardize the budget balance” and, for the same reason, will not support proposals from opposition parties that compromise the surplus.
“We will not give the government an alibi for not meeting the budget balance. And we do so for a very clear reason, because the government has responsibilities. We left the country growing at 3%, and this government is leaving the country growing at 2%. We left the country with wages growing much more than they are growing now. And this government, which has already spent all the surplus that we left, now has the responsibility to fulfill what it left in this State Budget,” he said, further reiterating that the socialists are supporting the budget “out of a sense of responsibility,” considering it “better to have some budget, even a bad one, than no budget at all” in which “the final year of the PRR (Plan for Recovery and Resilience) cannot be implemented.”
Today is the first of five days of voting in the so-called specialised debate, which culminates in a final global vote on Thursday November 27. This is a year that has seen record numbers of proposals submitted by the various parties – many of which would compromise public accounts.
As SIC reports, in the macroeconomic scenario, the PSD/CDS-PP government forecasts that Gross Domestic Product (GDP) will grow by 2% this year and 2.3% next. It aims to achieve surpluses of 0.3% of GDP this year and 0.1% next. As for the debt ratio, the executive estimates a reduction to 90.2% of GDP in 2025 and 87.8% in 2026.
arliament will debate the articles and proposed amendments to the 2026 State Budget in the morning, and in the afternoon they will be voted on, paragraph by paragraph, in a year that has once again seen record numbers of proposals submitted by the parties.
The parties submitted more than 2,000 proposed amendments by the deadline. According to the Parliament’s website, the PSD/CDS-PP submitted 57 proposals, Chega 614, the PS 117, the Liberal Initiative 112, Livre 330, the PCP 532, Bloco de Esquerda 182, PAN also 182 and JPP 50.
The debate and voting will start today and continue for five days, with a one-day break for the 25 November celebrations, with the closing of the debate and final overall vote scheduled for 27 November.
Among the proposed amendments are measures related to pension increases, with proposals from almost all parties, and the end or exemption of some tolls.
The Government submitted the 2026 State Budget to Parliament on 9 October, the day before the deadline and three days before the local elections.
In the macroeconomic scenario, the PSD/CDS-PP Government forecasts that Gross Domestic Product (GDP) will grow by 2% this year and 2.3% in 2026.
The executive aims to achieve surpluses of 0.3% of GDP this year and 0.1% next year. As for the debt ratio, it estimates a reduction to 90.2% of GDP in 2025 and 87.8% in 2026.
The budget was approved in its generality on October 28, with votes in favour from the PSD/CDS-PP coalition, abstentions from PS, PAN and JPP and votes against from CHEGA, Iniciativa Liberal, LIVRE and BE.
Source: SIC / LUSA
