Things get more complicated in federal formation talks

Some EUR 500 million will have to be found, which will make negotiations even more complicated.

The amount comes on top of the EUR 17 billion that were already on the table.

A report from the so-called Monitoringcomité, a panel of senior economic experts, comes to the conclusion that the federal government will have to find EUR 24 million extra this year and EUR 570 million next year to keep the budget on the right track.

Economic growth for this year will only reach 1.1 percent instead of 1.4 per cent, while for next year 1.5 percent is being put forward instead of 1.8 percent.

The parties at the table want to form a centre-right government with N-VA, CD&V, Open VLD and the Francophone liberals of MR, the so-called Swedish coalition.

They are not eager to introduce new taxes, which means that the cash has to be found by making cuts in expenditures.

The Christian democrats had proposed a tax on profits generated by financial transactions, but this was wiped off the table by the liberals.

Flandersnews.be / Expatica