The Parliament has voted for the increase of the child allowances on Thursday night in a extremely heated plenary session. The amendment that doubled child allowances in Romania from RON 84 to RON 150 has been filed by Liberal deputy Robert Sighiartău and has passed by 123 votes to 119, which set the Social Democrat Party and its chairman Liviu Dragnea on fire.
Dragnea, who was chairing the session, asked for the vote to be resumed, on the ground that the Liberals’ proposal that the money for the doubled allowances to be taken from pension budget surplus is not constitutional.
Eventually, following an emergency meeting of the PSD parliamentary groups, they decided that the amendment should remain in force, but that the money would come from a different source. More precisely, Dragnea filed an amendment later on stipulating a higher budget deficit from 2.55% to 2.765, so that it can entail the money for the allowances’ rise.
According to political sources, three MPs from ALDE, PSD’s ruling partners, 18 from UDMR, 3 PSD lawmakers, 3 representatives of the national minorities and four independent MPs voted for the Liberals’ amendment.
Therefore, allowances for children aged from 2 to 18 will rise from RON 84 to RON 150 as of March 1. Children aged from 0 to 2 will receive an allowance of RON 300 compared to RON 200 as until now.
While Liviu Dragnea slammed the PNL’s amendment as being demagogic and accused the initiators they have no knowledge about the budget rules and financial legislation, Liberal Sighiartău asked for Dragnea’s resignation: “You have money for special pensions, for your political clientele. You have money for those 27 ministries and for those over secretaries of state, for mistresses and nepotism. You are ruining the country. Resign!”