The economic and social response program for the Algarve presented by the PSD deputies, which was voted on in the Assembly of the Republic, had the majority of its 24 points approved, with favorable votes from the PSD, CDS, BE, IL and Chega, and with the abstention from the PCP and the PAN. PS deputies voted against all the measures presented by deputies Cristóvão Norte, Rui Cristina and Ofélia Ramos.
In a note sent to the newsrooms, the three Social Democratic deputies elected by the Algarve highlighted that “it is important that the Assembly of the Republic has required the Government to take specific measures for the region. The Algarve is facing a much more severe crisis than the rest of the country and if nothing really matters for months from now on, we will be facing a lot of rubble. The President of the Republic assumed that it was a national intention to have a specific program for the Algarve. The Government, in July, promised it. Where is it? Does it show up when companies go bankrupt and jobs are destroyed?».
The deputies say "they do not understand why the PS did not follow any of the 24 proposals presented", stating that "the Government does not do it, and the PS does not want the Assembly of the Republic to demand that the Government do it".
Among the 20 measures that were recommended for the Government to adopt, the PSD highlights «the reduction to half of the guarantee periods for access to unemployment benefit, the creation of a more favorable tax regime for companies based in the Algarve, for a transitional period of 3 years, which allocates a reduced rate of corporate income tax for SMEs, as is the case in the interior; to request the European Commission that, by way of exception, the region immediately benefit from the treatment with regard to Community funds from the convergence regions and not the transitional regime and, if this is not the case, be compensated through funds from the Budget. State".
It was also approved to recommend to the government the establishment, «for the purposes of the next community framework, of the obligation to guarantee a minimum percentage of funds to be allocated to sectors such as agriculture, sea, new technologies and renewable energies, among others, that promote greater diversification of the regional economy, the revision of the 2030 National Investment Program, in order to guarantee more investment for the Algarve, preparing the region for the future, namely in health, with the construction of the Hospital Central do Algarve, in terms of rail mobility, public transport, water management and the economy of the sea and the strengthening of TAP's air links with the region».
The extension of the simplified lay-off regime until March 2021, the creation of a program to train workers in the coming months, in exchange for preserving jobs, and the possibility of the holders of local accommodation being exempt from payment of capital gains, if they put their properties on lease, were other measures proposed, but failed in the Assembly of the Republic.
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