PEC of the Transition reaches signatures for processing in the Senate

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The government of president-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) presented this Tuesday (29) the 27 signatures needed to start the processing of the PEC (proposed amendment to the Constitution) of the Transition, the main bet for the payment of Bolsa Família at the current value of R$ 600 starting next year.

The PEC was filed this Monday (28) by the general rapporteur for the 2023 Budget, Senator Marcelo Castro (MDB-PI). 29 senators from ten parties signed the PEC: MDB, PT, PSD, PSB, Pros, Podemos, Rede, Cidadania, PDT and PP. The proposal may still receive support from other parliamentarians.

The text filed by Castro authorizes the elected government to exclude expenses with the Auxílio Brasil program —which will once again be called Bolsa Família— from the spending ceiling for a period of four years. The draft presented by the elected vice-president Geraldo Alckmin (PSB) foresaw the withdrawal of the benefit permanently.

On leaving the hotel where Lula is staying, in Brasília, PT vice-president, deputy Márcio Macedo (PT-SE), said that Senator Jaques Wagner (PT-BA) —one of those scheduled to negotiate the PEC with Congress — spoke with the president of the CCJ (Constitution and Justice Commission) of the Senate, Davi Alcolumbre (União Brasil-AP), about the vote on the text.

The idea of ​​the elected government is to approve the PEC in the CCJ and in the plenary on the same day, to concentrate the negotiations on the text in the commission. The rapporteur has not yet been defined, but the moves revolve around Alcolumbre himself or Senator Alexandre Silveira (PSD-MG), one of the main allies of Senate President Rodrigo Pacheco (PSD-MG).

Members of the elected government assess that it is necessary to start discussions in the Senate CCJ by the end of this week in order to have enough time for the vote. Marcelo Castro highlighted this Monday that the PEC must be approved in the Senate and in the House by December 16, in time to make adjustments to the 2023 Budget.

As shown to Sheet, the summit of Congress indicated that, in the current scenario, the Transition PEC only has a chance of being approved with a validity of two years. Faced with the diagnosis, PT members already privately admitted that the party would send the proposal with a maximum period of four years to, in practice, fight for two.

The PEC also provides for investments outside the spending ceiling in case of extraordinary revenue collection. In practice, the proposal has no specific value for these expenses, but estimates by the PT itself point to an extra ceiling expense of up to R$ 198 billion with the PEC.

In addition to maintaining Bolsa Família at R$600 as of January, the measure is negotiated by the elected government to institute an additional payment of R$150 per child up to six years old and honor other campaign commitments of the PT, such as raising the minimum wage and the resumption of investments.

The proposal also includes a device that allows the government to use resources obtained through donations in the execution of environmental projects. The articulation was made on the day that Lula spoke at COP27, the United Nations climate conference, demanding resources from rich countries and placing the fight against the climate crisis as a priority.

The same logic would be applied to federal universities, which would be authorized to run expenses outside the ceiling if they are financed with their own revenue, such as donations or funding. Today, this type of expenditure is subject to the limit, which generates complaints from institutions and stifles research projects.

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