Social Democrats claim they have votes to bring down government

Social Democrat leader Jiří Paroubek claims that he has enough votes to pass a no-confidence motion in Prime Minister Topolanek’s centre-right government. The comments were made during a press conference on Monday, in which Mr Paroubek threatened to call for the motion if the Civic Democrat controlled Senate attempted to reverse health-fee concessions passed last week by the lower house. The Social Democrat leader said that if health fee reductions are meddled with without Social Democrat consultation, the current government would fall. Mr Paroubek did not elaborate on which deputies would support him. The Social Democrats and the Communists currently have 97 votes in the 200-member lower chamber, while the governing coalition has 96. The remaining seven are independent deputies and coalition rebels who could swing either way. Four previous no-confidence votes called by the Social Democrats have failed.