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ROME (AP) — The Latest on Italy's new pro-European government (all times local):
7:10 p.m.
Italy's new pro-Europe government has won its final mandatory confidence vote in Parliament.
Premier Giuseppe Conte's coalition of rival parties clinched the Senate vote on Tuesday with 169 in favor, 133 against. Had Conte lost, he would have been forced to resign.
The new coalition is made up of former archrivals, the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement and the center-left Democrats.
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3 p.m.
Italian Premier Giuseppe Conte's new government faces a second confidence vote, needed for his uneasy left-leaning coalition to remain in power, as it prepares to approve a painful budget law that risks splitting the already shaky alliance.
After easily surviving a first confidence vote in the lower house Monday, Conte is also expected to win the confidence vote Tuesday in the upper house, where his fragile coalition, however, holds a slimmer majority.
The new coalition is made up of former archrivals, the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement and the center-left Democrats.
The new government will face its most pressing challenge after the Senate vote Tuesday evening. It needs to draft a painful budget law, which must be approved by Parliament by the end of the year, and avert a 23 billion euro sales tax hike that would prove very unpopular with voters and would further hit Italy's weak economic growth.
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