Haddad defends resuming parts of Provisional Measure 1303 and says he has not yet presented alternatives to Lula.

Reuters - Finance Minister Fernando Haddad argued on Wednesday, after meeting with Senate President Davi Alcolumbre (União-AP), that the "uncontroversial" parts of Provisional Measure 1303, which was shelved by the Chamber of Deputies last week, should be taken up again by Congress.

In a conversation with journalists after the meeting, Haddad said that he has not yet met with President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to present budgetary alternatives to the fall of the provisional measure, which expired without even being voted on by the deputies.

"I told him (Alcolumbre) that we should somehow recover what is uncontroversial (in MP 1303)," said Haddad, citing as uncontroversial sections of the proposal revisions to social benefit registries and spending cuts included in the text.

Haddad also said he sees no problem with the postponement of the vote on the Budget Guidelines Law (LDO) by Congress and asked that the Legislature approve laws consistent with the budget proposal.

"It's better to spend an extra week (on the Budget Guidelines Law) and finalize a text that makes sense to everyone, than to have inconsistencies between the Budget Guidelines Law, the Budget, and the laws that control tax expenditure and primary spending," he said.

"Whatever Congress decides, it has to be consistent. One law can't point in one direction and another law in a different direction, because otherwise we won't get the numbers to add up."

After stating the previous day in a hearing before the Senate's Economic Affairs Committee (CAE) that Provisional Measure 1303 was an important prerequisite for the Budget and that he would discuss the matter with Lula as soon as the president returned from his trip to Italy, which happened on Tuesday, Haddad said he had not yet presented any alternatives to Lula.

"I haven't met with the president yet, it's not scheduled," he stated.