“…Secondly, fiscal policy must be prevented from becoming a mere passive sounding box for the economic cycle and external disturbances. In both cases, pluriannual budgeting exercises, backed up by other available instruments (Martner, 1996), can help to promote a succession of non-traumatic public de cisions in this respect, while providing greater assur ance that the set of actions in question is sustainable in the medium and long term.…”