Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte faces two days of parliamentary votes that will decide if his fragile coalition can cling to power or has lost its majority, pushing Italy into deeper political turmoil.

Conte will address the lower house on Monday and the upper house, the Senate, on Tuesday about the future of his government after a junior partner quit the cabinet in a row over the handling of the twin coronavirus and economic crises.

Votes will be held in both chambers, with Conte struggling to fill the hole left by the defection of former premier Matteo Renzi and his small Italia Viva party.

Attention is especially focused on the 321-seat Senate, where Conte could be 10 votes short of an absolute majority after his efforts to persuade centrists in opposition ranks to rally to his side looked to have failed.

Renzi has said his 18 senators will probably abstain on Tuesday. If they do, the coalition will likely win the ballot, but without an absolute majority, the government will be inherently unstable and it is not clear if President Sergio Mattarella would let Conte limp on in such a scenario.

Further muddying the waters, the co-ruling Democratic Party (PD), will want a cabinet reshuffle and a renegotiation of the coalition pact should the prime minister overcome the challenge in parliament, a PD official who declined to be named told Reuters.

Italia Viva has said it would return to the coalition if its policy demands are met. "Our problems can be sorted out in two hours," party lawmaker Ettore Rosato told Sky Italia TV.

However, both the center-left PD and its coalition ally, the Five-Star Movement, have said they want nothing more to do with Renzi, accusing him of betrayal.

A survey published in Wednesday's Corriere della Sera newspaper suggests there is also little public support for Renzi, once a rising star who served as premier from 2014 to 2016.

Some 73 percent of those polled said Renzi was acting out of self-interest, rather than that of the country, and asked to take sides, 55 percent preferred Conte – with just 10 percent backing Renzi.

"I will never vote for a government that considers itself the best in the world, that has seen 82,000 deaths and has not taken the ESM (European Stability Mechanism, an international financial institution to help euro area countries in severe financial distress)," Renzi told state broadcaster RAI on Sunday.

Nicola Zingaretti, head of the PD, said it was a "mistake that hurts Italy." 

"We need investments, jobs, healthcare to fight the pandemic," he said. "Not a government crisis."

Conte, who was an obscure law professor before being chosen to head the government in 2018, has already proved his political skills.

His first coalition comprised the Five-Star Movement and the far-right League, but after the latter withdrew in August 2019, he created a new government with the the Five-Star Movement and PD.

(With input from Reuters and AFP)