The long-anticipated decisions on consumer support in the face of soaring energy prices, expected on Friday, will not be made until next week, Belga reported, citing a reliable source.
According to them, the Federal Government needs more time to finalise the technical details of the measures. In protest, French-speaking liberal party MR leader Georges-Louis Bouchez is blocking other government dossiers in the meantime, he announced.
Before the Easter holidays, the government decided to channel the extra tax revenue resulting from high energy prices back to two groups: vulnerable households heating with fossil fuels, and people who can only travel to work by their own car. The measures were intended to be temporary and expire automatically.
Bouchez demanded that the government finalise the support measures on Friday, threatening that he would block further government work.
"Given the persistently high energy prices resulting from the conflict in the Middle East, the government is continuing the technical development of targeted and temporary measures," the cabinet of Prime Minister Bart De Wever (N-VA) said.
"These measures will meet the needs of the next three months and aim to protect the purchasing power of the target groups as defined during the cabinet meeting of April 3. The discussion of the elaborated proposals will take place within the cabinet during the course of next week," it stated.
The cabinet is scheduled to meet again on the evening of 21 April.
"All some people want is to stall for time," Bouchez wrote on X. According to him, there is certainly no budgetary problem.
He wrote: "Seriously though: the support would amount to between €50 and €100 million, on a budget of €170 billion. The MR ministers have implemented all the savings mandated to them in the coalition agreement, and (Minister of Employment) David Clarinval has even done €300 million better. Why then are other ministers deviating by €3.4 billion? It is nice to appear to be the great defender of the budget, but it is even better to actually be one, like us"
Pending energy support, the MR is blocking other dossiers within the government. As a result, the vast majority of agenda items on Friday's Council of Ministers would not be approved for the time being, according to a government source.
The French-speaking social democratic party PS also denounced the postponement.
"If people weren’t already struggling so much, you’d wonder if this is a joke. But today, some families don't know how to fill their water tanks for heating, self-employed people who are seeing their profit margins disappear, and workers who hesitate before driving to work. And the government still finds a way to postpone things. Unbelievable!" said the PS leader, Pierre-Yves Dermagne.
This story has been updated.
