The President of Latvia pointed out that the interests and proposals of social partners and entrepreneurs should be more taken into account when planning and drafting the state budget henceforth. "It will be one of my priorities. I have emphasized both to the Prime Minister, the Minister of Economics and the Minister of Justice that the government should carry out a series of urgent measures to strengthen industrial competitiveness in collaboration with social partners and business organizations,” stressed the President of Latvia. He expressed hope that the agreement between the entrepreneurs and the head of government on the commitment to launch formation of a new negotiation platform, where organized business and the responsible ministers, and top civil servants would meet, would bring the expected results.
President of Latvia Raimonds Vējonis offered to consider opportunities to channel a part of the corporate income tax to the budget of that local government, on the territory of which a company operated as a solution to promote creation of new businesses and new jobs in the regions, cooperation between local government and business. Thus, it would be an additional resource, stimulus and also responsibility of every municipality to promote entrepreneurship, not blaming the government or limited options of the state budget every time.
In his speech, the President of Latvia stressed the regional reform as well, in which special attention should be not paid to a number of regions and inclusion of large cities into those regions, but attention should be paid to the fact, what territories should be established so that they would be capable of economic development, ensuring the necessary infrastructure and services to population.
He said that strategic objectives and action plans for regional development should be born in live negotiations among entrepreneurs, local governments, and the government rather than quite isolated on a paper in an office. “So that the interests of the public, the state, and local governments would be met, more discussions on the regional reform are required. Both local governments themselves and their residents, and the social partners of the government, as well as businesses should engage in the discussions,” said Raimonds Vējonis, pointing out that the present Congress was a very good example of potential fruitful discussion to find out good and feasible solutions.