Giorgia Meloni is now speaking live from Bari.

Let's welcome her with an applause that shakes the whole theater and is heard throughout Puglia, the President of the Council, Giorgia Meloni! Good evening everyone, thank you for being here. Thank you for this welcome, thank you for this enthusiasm, which is very important for us. Guys, let me catch the plane, we have to go fast. I love you! I said thank you for this welcome, you have to sit down otherwise they can't see you. Thank you for this greeting, which for me represents an extraordinary dose of enthusiasm. No, no, thank you, thank you. I love you! But I also said thank you because this crowded room and this enthusiasm are, let's say, a story. And they are the best answer to those who keep saying that Puglia can't change, that Puglia doesn't want to change. Always remember one thing, there are no results already written at the start. There are no destinies already written. There is work, there is determination, there is good faith, there is the passion that you put in a battle, that you put in any battle. There is what each of us decides to build every day, brick by brick, with constancy and with conviction. And this is what decides the success of any battle. And we, and look, we have widely demonstrated this. I remember when they said that Fratelli d'Italia couldn't reach 5% of the consensus. In the last poll it was estimated at 31.4% of the consensus. The highest level ever after three years of government, something that had never happened since the polls existed. I remember when they said that we would never reach the government of the nation and today we are governing this nation. I remember when they said that we would never reach the government of the nation for more than six months and today we are the third longest-running government in the history of Italy, third out of 68. I remember when they said that if the centre-right had governed Italy, Italy would have been isolated internationally and three days ago the Financial Times said that Europe should learn from Italy. Because in three years we have rebuilt the image of this nation. We were the black sheep of Europe and today we are a nation that can show the way to others. This is what we have done. I could give many other examples. The point is that it wasn't by chance, it wasn't by luck, because if you look around you realise that we were all lucky. But also because we know that it was a lot of work, a lot of sacrifice, a lot of determination, a lot of faith, a lot of common sense and a lot of awareness of how great and how much potential the extraordinary nation that we have been given the honour of leading has. It was a choice, because the decline is not a destiny, but a choice. Because overcoming that decline is a choice. Because believing in ourselves is a choice. Because having the courage to not be limited by others is a choice. And in democracy you make that choice. You must always remember it. It is you who decide with your vote a future that is never written in writing. So, thank you for being here. And thank you for saying with your presence and your enthusiasm that you want to face us in a challenge whose outcome is not decided. We are many tonight, but I am sure that we will be even more, that you will be even more in the coming days, in the coming weeks, in every square, in every district, in every city, to tell the story of Luigi Lobuono and to tell the story of the centre-right. A challenge that we aim to win, because we are not afraid of anyone. And I want to obviously thank Antonio, Matteo, Maurizio, Antonio. We are here, still united as we have been for 30 years, united as he imagined us, united as a great Pugliese would have wanted us today, who at 90 years old, from his birth, we all remember with emotion, was called Pinuccio Tadarel. A man of the people, in love with his land, who knew how to unite intelligence, vision, passion and irony and who I am sure, looking at us and finding us still here together, smiles today. Because what you see here is not an unnatural alliance held together by the falling glue of interest, it is not a system of consolidated power that tries to sell itself as a new proposal, simply to perpetuate itself. And perhaps it is not even just a team, it is a community. It is a community of people, a community of ideas, a community of vision, a community of people who are together by choice and who are proud to fight side by side with the same determination for 30 years. And to the left, who hoped to find us divided, fragile, tired, tired for the truth we are a little bit, but we are also very, very determined. We clearly want to say that every time we are called to defend the ideas we believe in, every time we are called to do our part, we are used to being found ready. And look, we have shown this too. When we presented ourselves to the political elections, the Brothers of Italy chose to use the slogan Ready. We were widely laughed at for this. The left said, where are they going? How ready? But you haven't even governed a condominium. Eh, did you understand? Oh God, I love you. But we were ready. And look, I'm not saying it, you say it. This enthusiasm, this consensus, says it all. Because if we had really failed, as the left has said, in these three years in government, today we would not have a higher consensus than the one that has brought us to the government of the nation. Clearly the left has an answer for this too. And the answer is that you are stupid. A few days ago there was a philosopher on television who said that I win because those who deal with my make-up are very good. In fact, you vote for me because I have good make-up. Now, given the fact that I do my make-up on my own and I don't do it so well, do you realize how superficial the readings of these intellectuals from the living room are? That in practice they tell us that Italians vote by looking at the photographs and not the contents. And these are the philosophers. Imagine the others. These are the intellectuals. And look, it is exactly, these are exactly these, let's say, brilliant theories. We are used to the fact that when Italians vote for the centre-right they are stupid, they are uneducated, they are superficial. These are exactly these theories, exactly this assumption that the left has brought to the margins of political life. Their alleged superiority, the annoyance they feel for ordinary people, the total lack of humility, the inability to get into a discussion, that never lets them listen, that makes them talk only among themselves, locked up in their golden contexts. We are used to it. But the reality is very different. The reality is that Italians recognize the work, they recognize the dedication, they recognize the seriousness. They see that we are giving our all. Of course, things don't always go as we would like. We can always improve. We have to do more. We have to do better. And you should never stop reminding us of what is wrong. You have to be implacable with us. You have to be pretentious. Because this makes a people and a community compared to their representatives. But we are giving our all. And we are doing it without saving ourselves, without stopping, and above all without personal interests to defend. And this is why we can present ourselves with our heads held high in a room like this, to claim the work we have done so far, the results that this work has produced, even in objectively very complex conditions, given both by an international context, which you can see better than me, but also given by the guests who have left us, these professionals of the brilliant ideas of the next day. You have seen that now they have the answers to any question. They have a lot of good ideas and you don't understand why, when they have been in government for ten years, they haven't even put those ideas into practice. They come to explain to us now that they are opposed. We have put in front of everyone the Italians and their real needs. We have set out a vision, a strategy, we have pursued it with concreteness, with continuity, as demonstrated by the last law of balance that we presented to the Chamber. This is the fourth manoeuvre that we are writing in three years. It is a manoeuvre worth 18.7 billion euros. It has been defined as a manoeuvre because it does not have enough money, always from the opposition. It is worth remembering the opposition that we could have made a great manoeuvre if in the same year when we are writing a law of balance with 18.7 billion euros we did not have 40 billion euros of super bonus credits to repay thanks to the brilliant achievements of Giuseppe Conti. 40 billion euros to pay for the restructuring of the second house, of the castles, of the villas to people who could afford it in many cases even without the contribution of the State with money that was taken from the lower middle income. And then they talk to us about equity. Now they talk to us about equity. The left talks to us about equity. We have made the manoeuvre to help the most vulnerable, the lower middle income and the middle class and we have asked to make a contribution to the banks. They talk to us about equity who took the money from the workers to give it to the banks. Lessons from these people even not gentlemen. However, despite the few resources available we have worked to give some important signals on the same priorities that we have identified in these three years family and birth, health, we have allocated to families that are the backbone of any society 1.6 billion euros more an investment that will allow us for example to exclude the first house up to certain limits of the level of the catastrophe from the calculation of the ISEE for the delivery of the services of the State because for us the first house is a sacred asset that will allow us to strengthen the bonus for working mothers because I will never stop repeating that if you want to build equality the only way you have to do it is not to put a woman in a position to have to choose between being a mother and having a job This is equality freedom we have defended the purchasing power of families we have further reduced the taxes with 2.8 billion euros that we have allocated to cut the benefits on the average income we have intervened in favour of workers with low incomes reducing the taxation to 5% on the retributive increases of the general wage the seventh in three years strictly on Friday because we never do the revolution on Tuesday we do it on Friday to demonstrate that the contents of the procedures and above all the rights of the workers are not exactly priority for some and the left as we had with the previous balance sheets with Cuneo we have allocated 18 billion euros per year in favour of those who earn up to 35.000 euros per year with this balance sheet we have added the reduction of the income from 28 to 50.000 per month and maybe it keeps three children and a rich man who has to work I don't agree they are people who work and have to help then we have supported the companies the investments the innovation we have refinanced the tax credit and we continue to invest in health in 2026 the national health fund will reach 143 billion which is 17 billion more than when we started 17 billion in three years a record reduction never seen before with the good will of a leftist who keeps using the fake ballot because he doesn't want to give in to the reality of facts and numbers because numbers are not an opinion and because our goal if the regions give us a hand because you know that the competence is mainly of the regions is to reduce the waiting lists and here too things are starting to go better because we have stopped giving 1,300,000 more benefits to the Italians if we continue at the end of the year we will have given 2 million more than the previous year thanks to the choices that this government that put its face on a challenge that no one dared to put their face they are talking about a system of monitoring of waiting lists everyone tells you that there is a problem of waiting lists in Italy but if you wanted to know which are the regions where there is a problem of waiting lists you wouldn't know because no one was monitoring this phenomenon so we have started we have valued the strategic sectors of our production system by the way today the first recognition of Italian cuisine in UNESCO in Puglia we know something in Puglia it is the biggest enemy we have reduced taxes in short we have done a very hard work to raise the average income to raise the salaries for two years the salaries have grown more than the inflation we have implemented tools that allow the south to compete we have abolished the citizenship income and we have replaced it with the dignity of a job with the freedom of not having to depend on politics we have replaced it with incentives for those who invest in these regions with incentives for those who take over we have replaced it with infrastructures with opportunities for the rest of Italy it could be done the GDP in the south grows more than the national average the occupation in the south grows more than the national average and this is the result of a mentality for which this land does not ask to be maintained by politics but asks to be put by politics in a condition to compete we have invested in the pride of this territory in the pride of these people and it is working because the results are coming and then we have implemented historical constitutional reforms that our people have been waiting for for decades that no one has been able to bring forward to build a more modern and more efficient state the reform of the premierate the reform of autonomy the reform of capital Rome the reform of justice after decades we have been able to approve the reform that introduces the separation of careers between judges and judges which means strengthening the judiciary the disciplinary court which means that finally when a magistrate makes a mistake there will be a third body to judge him because as the spider man says great power also derives great responsibility and which provides that the CSM members are sorted between magistrates with specific requisites which means political currents from the game of having to depend on political currents rather than on their own merit to advance as a career norms of common sense for which we are obviously accused of any infamy they say that we want full powers that we want to subject the magistrate to politics but what they can't stand is that we are doing exactly the opposite which is to nominate a piece of the CSM and this is actually what the left doesn't want that we take control of politics because we don't want a magistrate controlled by us we want a magistrate that is not controlled by anyone we want a magistrate that is free and I am certain that thousands of magistrates in the secret of the ballot will vote for their merit and they know it even left-wing opponents will vote in secret they know they are norms of common sense in fact they say vote no to the referendum to send Meloni home but gentlemen put your souls in peace Meloni and the government arrive at the end of the legislature and then ask Italians to be judged on their total work Meloni at home can only be sent by Italians something that the left is not used to democracy I have to hurry I have to run so, since we arrive at the end of the legislature at the referendum on justice vote according to the reform ok? easy if you think that in justice everything is fine you can vote no to the referendum and vote against the reform if instead you think that justice in Italy can improve my advice is to vote yes and confirm the reform that justice will work better so, things clearly I am not saying that all problems are solved I am saying that we are doing an important job that things are better than before that we can always do better as well as we can do better here in Puglia because, let's be honest the beauty, the strength of this region deserve more than the left that for 20 years ruled it let's be honest Puglia is wonderful not thanks to the left but despite the left despite a system of closed power self-referential too committed to protect the energy and talents that this land continues to express and can express even more a system used to divide between friend and foe instead of valuing the merit that turns politics into a control machine rather than a tool to create opportunities we have worked a lot in these years for Puglia to do our part I remember the cohesion agreements that were signed in the middle of the euro that allowed us to launch many important projects infrastructure, economy business, health, transportation education, tourism and we send a hug from here to a great Puglian that represents us in Europe that signed in time those cohesion agreements that were signed by Raffaele Fito that is Raffaele Fito we have allocated important resources for the health of the territory and here we have to remember and thank another great Puglian the undersecretary Marcello Gemmato I think of the 64 million euros that we have put in place to re-qualify the polyclinic of Foggia a concrete response that is included in the framework of strengthening the national health system with good will and Peconte that tell us that we have not done enough but then they forget to say that Puglia, governed by them is the last region in Italy for respect of the waiting times for health services start to show this attention to health where you govern gentlemen of the left I also think of the incentives for the adoption of women of the under 35 also here only by stimulating investments and growth we can really guarantee the future to people who were born here and who want to see their children born here who do not want to have to leave simply because here they do not find the right opportunities but I also want to tell you I love you because it makes me laugh this left that discovers the emergencies always too late now they have realized that there is the hydric emergency in Puglia incredible better late than never because it is curious how they forget in a hurry twenty years of wrong policies that have put agriculture down leaving thousands of companies without water, without support without future to create clientele instead of to create development just as it was not done enough on the Xylella another wound that you know well they blocked the dams they spread misinformation they turned the sick trees into fetuses to defend while the contagion advanced inexorably from one head to the other of the region so Puglia lost a huge part of its oil production the whole family was left without income a year ago our government sanctioned another 30 million to face the Xylella emergency but still today at the Ministry of Agriculture we are waiting certain, clear data on the management of the 120 million already allocated to the region for the restoration of olive trees fragmentary information incomplete accounting unacceptable specialty for such an important matter for the economy and also for the identity of this region and so we do not stop we have put in place another 300 million euros with the Cultiva Italia program that Minister Lollobrigida wanted for a large olive plant that allows to re-plant re-launch, rebuild the cultural and identity economic heritage that we can only hope that those funds tomorrow will be managed by someone who really cares about his land so friends we have built and presented a serious, concrete credible program to lead this project we asked a man of great qualities human, professional and political his name is Luigi Lobuono Luigi is an entrepreneur of great experience of great skills is a man who has been able to re-launch one of the greatest economic realities of southern Italy like the Levant Fair bringing it to successes that were not imaginable he is a man who is putting who wants to put at the disposal of all Puglia those skills, those energies those capacities that he has at his disposal in a difficult race that he does not consider to be unexpected we know where we want to go we know how to get there but the rest of the work you have to do now you are in every square in every city of this beautiful land you have to tell about the best Puglia of this region and if at the end of this race we will have done everything we could do maybe we will finally be able to inaugurate here a new season of freedom a new season of good government long live Puglia long live Italy long live Italian brothers long live the centre-right long live Luigi Lobuono thank you, I love you