ZAGREB, August 8, 2018 – The leader of the Labour and Solidarity Party, Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandić, said on Wednesday that Croatia needs essential reforms that the government should have the courage to implement and one of those means to introduce a property tax, adding that his party won’t support the tax reform but that it is not poised to bring down the government.
Addressing a press conference, the party’s economic analyst Ljubo Jurčić, and a Zagreb City official, who too is in Bandić’s party, Mirka Jozić, criticised the government’s taxation policy explaining that “redistributing income cannot achieve anything substantial.”
Jurčić warned that the taxation policy makes no mention of industrial policy or how to remove obstacles to increasing milk and meat production which currently doesn’t satisfy domestic demand.
Bandić believes that Croatia needs essential reforms which, however, requires a stable government and that is why he supports the incumbent government.
He recalled a European Charter on Local Self-Government which the Croatian government is a signatory to and which among other things says “Local authorities’ financial resources shall be commensurate with the responsibilities provided for by the constitution and the law.” He considers that they leads to discrepancy which isn’t good but also that he “profoundly believes that Zagreb will survive that.”
Bandić expects property taxes to be introduced and questioned why has that been postponed for two years because it is necessary to stimulate the rich to give more to the community since they have taken more and made their wealth in their communities.
He added that his party would not abandon this government because “we don’t have a better one”.
