Amid intimations of a possible split between the liberals and the conservatives in the ruling coalition, party representatives held a meeting on November 28 to discuss disagreements during a recent budget vote.
“We meet all the time, today is a regular Monday meeting, we are going to continue to meet, everything is fine,” Viktorij Cmilyte-Nielsen, leader of the Liberal Movement, reassured after the meeting.
Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte, delegated by the conservative Homeland Union – Lithuanian Christian Democrats (TS-LKD), refrained from comments, saying that everything had already been said.
On November 23, the TS-LKD presidium said that the liberal Freedom Party, another coalition partner, had violated the coalition agreement when its MPs initiated amendments to the budget bill uncoordinated with the Cabinet. Freedom Party MPs wanted VAT exemptions for catering businesses to remain in place for the entire year of 2023, rather than just until July. The proposal was also supported by the conservative MP Mykolas Majauskas, who was subsequently expelled from the party and stood to lose the chairmanship of the parliamentary Committee on Finance and Budget.
However, the TS-LKD decided not to take any further action that could split the ruling coalition.
Meanwhile, the Freedom Party’s key platform items – such as legislation on same-sex partnership and decriminalisation of light drugs – have been stalled due to lack of support from the conservatives.
Freedom Party leader and Economy Minister Ausrine Armonaite said after the meeting that the coalition partners discussed December. However, she did not say whether the party would insist on including civil union and drug law amendments into the agenda before the end of the parliament session.
“We had a working meeting, these meetings are held regularly. Since we believe we need to talk among ourselves, and not through the media, I will not disclose the content of the conversation either, we discussed the work for December,” Armonaite told reporters.
Cmilyte-Nielsen said there were no requests to put bills on civil unions and the decriminalisation of light drugs on the agenda before Christmas, adding that both bills had gone through the initial submission stage and “may or may not appear on the agenda”.
Radvile Morkunaite-Mikuleniene, the leader of the TS-LKD political group in the parliament, insisted that the coalition would continue to function. According to her, the parties in the coalition agreed on the session agenda and “there’s no drama in it”. (LRT/Business World Magazine)