SDP parliamentary leader Paulo Mota Pinto this Thursday believes President-elect Luis Montenegro “can bring the momentum of the political struggle” in favor of the party, ensuring that he does everything in this direction.

During a lunchtime debate at the International Club of Portugal in Lisbon on the topic “Great Challenges for Portugal”, one of the participants asked Mota Pinta why he never recognized himself as the leader of the SDP.

The leader of parliament began by classifying as “baseless, inappropriate and even slightly inelegant” any speculation about the SDP presidency, as the party held direct elections on Saturday.

“We have an elected president and I think he can spark a political struggle dynamic that I hope will help and I will do my best so that he can support the SDP,” he said.

However, the SDP leader cited his personal experience – his father Carlos Mota Pinto was the SDP leader and prime minister – to emphasize the “personal cost” that these positions entail.

“It’s not in my plans and it never was in their plans,” he said.

AREAS IN WHICH PORTUGAL HAS IMPORTANT ISSUES AND NEED REFORMS

In his speech, Paulo Mota Pinto noted five areas “where Portugal is facing major challenges and where reforms are needed”: health, justice, demographics, political system and, as the main problem, economic growth.

near justicethe leader of the social democratic bench called the last years of socialist rule a “lost legislature” and left an unexpected compliment to former prime minister José Socrates.

“I’m sorry to say this, but this government and this prime minister are the least reformist and the most conservative since April 25th. The engineer Socrates, for all his faults, was more reformist and more willing to attack some established interests than the current prime minister,” he said.

On the healthMota Pinto considered it necessary to “relinquish ideological prejudice” and conduct a “cost-benefit assessment” of who provides the best service in any given case, be it the public or the private sector.

O the economic growthMota Pinto urged the prime minister to not just say “history explains” that Portugal has been overtaken by several eurozone countries in recent years.

“This cannot be an alibi, there is no historical fatalism here. […] I think the fundamental problem was that we were not pursuing the right policies,” he said.

Above politic systemMota Pinto defended the need for a “wide debate” between the PSD and PS, and considered the outcome of the January 30 parliamentary elections “the most random majority that Portugal has had”, taking the opportunity to leave some criticism of the dialogue announcements. by the socialists.

“The practice was not like this: negotiations on the budget only with deputies PAN, Livre and PSD-Madeira […] this is not a very healthy practice and contradicts the readiness for dialogue,” he said.

GROWTH OF THE EXTREMELY RIGHT

Saying they don’t want to normalize is enough Mota Pinto believed that the recent rise of the extreme right in Portugal was due to some historical “correction” of the political system.which “was skewed to the left”.

“We had a far left and we didn’t have a far right, in my opinion, both are equally undesirable and not amenable to normalization,” he said.

DRAFT REVISION OF LABOR LEGISLATION

The leader of the parliament from the PSD stressed that the party had prepared a draft to revise the electoral law, which could be quickly submitted to parliament if it was a “political priority” of the new direction, which included the reduction of existing constituencies and limited mandates. deputies.

“Do we have the strength, do we have the will to solve these problems? To be honest, I don’t see much from the current absolute majority. On my part, and as long as it has some responsibility, the SDP will not fail to do this,” he assured.

Last Saturday, when he was elected SDP President, Luis Montenegro said that he would meet with the Chairman of the Bench this week, but at the moment there is no public news that this meeting has already taken place.

The dinner was attended by several deputies, including almost the entire leadership of the bench: vice-presidents Andre Coelho Lima, Paula Cardoso, Paulo Ríos de Oliveira, Catarina Rocha Ferreira and Fatima Ramos, as well as secretaries Hugo Carneiro and Sofia Matos.

Deputies Joaquim Sarmento, Nuno Carvalho, Carlos Eduardo Reis, Claudia Andre and Thiago Moreira de Sa, former CDS-PP leader José Ribeiro y Castro, former Christian Democrat minister Mota Soares, former finance minister Eduardo Catroga and ex AICEP president Pedro Reis were also present. at lunch.

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