Report to provide new government with a platform for launching civil reforms, addressing economic crisis.
By SHELLY PAZSteinitz got milk 248 88(photo credit: Ariel Jerozolimski)
Binyamin Netanyahu's 100-day team introduced a platform Thursday for the new government to follow during its first few months.
The team, headed by Likud MK Yuval Steinitz, convened in the Knesset and presented plans it had formulated to handle the economic crisis.
It also detailed plans to quickly stabilize the governing system, and to institute reforms for the Israel Lands Administration.
The team presented to Prime Minister-designate Binyamin Netanyahu a comprehensive report on the issues that need to be addressed and ways to tackle them.
"We have prepared a platform for launching a government that has reform in its character and proactivity in its actions," Steinitz told Netanyahu on Thursday.
The team members explained that some issues were examined more thoroughly than others.
They did not closely address security issues, claiming they had already been examined in different frameworks.
The authors of the report said its main goal had been to provide the new government with a prepared platform for launching civil reforms, while seriously addressing the economic crisis and its implications.
The team made following recommendations:
• The government will guarantee credit from banks to pubic institutions and avoid using state money.
• It will organize payment arrangements between lenders and creditors in an attempt to solve the credit shortage in the market.
• The government should avoid bailing out individual companies, instead, leaving their fate to the market forces.
•Assuming that banks and institutional bodies would avoid providing credit to companies whose potential losses exceed 20-25 percent, the government should guarantee the credit, although but under significant interests that will create another source of income for the state.
• The government should guarantee loans made to small and medium businesses by bank funds and the business sector.
• The government should create and strengthen overseas economic deals. This, the committee said, would create sources for the business sector and prevent a massive purchase of bonds for savings and public investing.
• The government should examine 30 projects that have stagnated due to bureaucratic difficulties and thus guarantee new jobs.
• There should be a gradual reform in the Israel Lands Administration, removing the state oversight of local plans in cities with more than 100,000 residents.
The team suggested that Netanyahu use the difficult economic situation to perform structural changes in the market that can only be done during periods of crisis.
After receiving the report, Netanyahu said that government's job was to ensure the security and prosperity of Israel, and that "the challenges the government will face are tougher than we have ever known. What we need is unity and a plan."
He informed the members of the team that the government would choose suitable plans from its many recommendations.
"In addition to immediate action in the economic field, the government must carry out changes in the education system and in internal security," Netanyahu stated.
He added that some of the issues would be discussed in other forums. "A
great part of my time will be dedicated to ensuring security and personal safety," he promised.
Netanyahu expressed hopes that the government would be sworn in next week and start the difficult work to follow. "We didn't come here to sit on chairs, but to work for the sake of the state," he said.•
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