The bank ING has denied taking any decision to withdraw a 500-million-euro credit line from the Brussels-Capital Region by the end of the year. Belgian press agency Belga reported that the Dutch had taken the decision yesterday. Earlier Belgian state-owned bank Belfius decided to withdraw the credit line that it had provided to the regional authorities in Brussels.
Meanwhile, the state of region’s finances has worsened further. The caretaker government that has limited powers, no majority and can’t take any significant policy decisions works with a budget based on so-called “provisional twelfths”. Each provisional twelfth is one twelfth of the last budget passed by parliament. In the case of the Brussels-Capital Region this is the 2024 budget.
ING confirmed it is still in talks on renewing a contract that offers the Brussels-Capital Region a half-a-billion-euro credit line but which runs out on 31 December 2025.
The Brussels-Capital Region is seriously in the red and any attempts so far to form a new coalition government have failed. The finance minister in the outgoing Brussels regional government Dirk De Smedt (Flemish liberal) confronted with the erroneous report repeated his warning that Brussels risks a US-style shutdown if a new budget is not passed soon.
De Smedt added that he has been trying to make the message clear within the regional government for several weeks now. "I hope that my colleagues are also aware of this urgency. We must act now. Only through a new credible financial strategy and a multi-year budgetary plan in which we structurally reduce the deficit, can we guarantee the continuity of our services and the stability of Brussels”.
UPDATE:
Dutch bank ING has not yet made a decision about the credit line for Brussels. The bank emphasised this after the Belga press agency had previously reported that the credit line had been suspended. ‘After further consultation, it has been decided to sit down at the table again, which is good news in itself,’ Brussels finance minister Dirk De Smedt (Flemish liberal Open VLD) says.