Renzi reiterates willing to quit if reform fails

Premier not ready to go forward at all costs

(ANSA) - Rome, April 29 - Premier Matteo Renzi reiterated Tuesday that he was ready to quit if his planned institutional reforms do not come to fruition.

He also told a meeting of his centre-left Democratic Party (PD) that he did "not accept" those who call his institutional reforms, including a revamp of the Senate, "authoritarian". . The executive is trying to find a compromise over its bill to change the Constitution to overhaul the country's slow, costly political apparatus, after recent friction about its intended transformation of the Senate. The support of the opposition centre-right Forza Italia (FI) party for the reforms has looked in doubt in recent weeks, with its leader Silvio Berlusconi alternating between criticism of the plan and pledges to uphold it. Renzi won the agreement of three-time premier Berlusconi for the reforms at a meeting in January, a month before he toppled Enrico Letta, his colleague in the centre-left Democratic Party (PD), to become Italy's youngest-ever premier at 39. The central part of the package is to turn the Senate into a leaner assembly of local-government representatives with minimal law-making powers to make passing legislation easier.

Renzi has said this will also save lots of public money, as the State will no longer have to fork out extra for the salaries of Senators, who will already be getting paid at the local level.

However, there have been calls from FI and from within Renzi's own centre-left Democratic Party for the new Senate to remain an elected assembly. "We have to keep Forza Italia on board," Renzi told a meeting of PD Senators, adding that it will be up to each region to decide how to select its representatives in the new Upper House. "It's our way of telling the Italian people that we are not writing the rules on our own". Renzi has staked his credibility on reforming the Senate, saying he will quit politics completely if he fails. He has said that he was ready to make some changes and would not "hang himself" if he misses the target of having the first reading of the bill completed in the Senate before the May 25 European elections.

But he also made it plain Tuesday that he was not willing to waste time or accept a compromise that would turn the original plan on its head. "Moving quickly is the only way to give a signal of credibility to Europe," Renzi said. "We'll do everything possible up to the last minute to find common ground. Otherwise I'm ready to take a step back. "I'm not willing to do things at all costs. "It's either like this, or I'll go home".