Despite one’s hopes that every session will bring a new chance, everything is continuing from where it left off in the spring – perhaps with the difference that I’d like to ask the leader of the Democratic Coalition and his MPs to be patient. Let’s have understanding for them, let’s understand the agitation in their ranks, because now they’ll have to fight to get back into Parliament again. At such times people get agitated.
Although it’s now well over an hour ago, on the economic issues, there were some in the Jobbik ranks who questioned the policy of economic neutrality and accused the Government of trying to achieve it solely with Chinese credit. I’d like to inform you that we’ve just applied to the European Development Bank for a major loan to develop Hungary’s rail system. I’d also like to inform you that we’re accepting loans not only from China and not only from the European financial markets, but also from Japan and Qatar; and, when necessary, we’re incorporating them in the development of the Hungarian economy.
I must respond to your comment about the “technological dead end”: the claim that electromobility is a technological dead end. In this field I’m not an expert from the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, so in these difficult matters I usually take the approach of asking the people concerned. In the past few months I’ve had talks with the top managers of all the major German car manufacturers. I put this question to them, and they said that this isn’t a dead end, that this is the future, and that what we’re doing is good.
As far as the issue of job vacancies and foreign guest workers is concerned, there’s a clear rule, a rule of thumb, which is binding on us, and to which the Government always adheres: Hungary belongs to the Hungarians, Hungarian jobs belong to the Hungarians, and there will only be as many guest workers in Hungary as there are vacancies – and not one more.
You spoke about crime being on the rise. I’d like to counter this by saying that Hungary is the safest country in Europe today, and that to create the impression that Hungary is – as you put it – “flooded with crime” is quite simply not true. Not only is this contradicted by reality, but it also belittles the work of the tens of thousands of police officers who have made it possible for us to dramatically reduce crime over the last ten years or more and make this area of life a success in European terms. So I advise you not to exaggerate. Every crime must be tackled, and one crime is too many, but this is no reason to disparage the work of our police officers.
But where I agree with you – and with [the political weekly] Mandiner – is on drug trafficking. I also see serious problems here. Drug dealing and the spread of drugs are a serious challenge. We used to think – having learned and observed it earlier – that this was basically a metropolitan phenomenon; but I see that this is no longer the case, and it’s also ravaging the ranks of the rural poor. So in the coming period an important task for the Government will be to take the toughest possible action against drug trafficking and drug distribution. Comprehensive state action will be needed, and I expect the Interior Minister to always prepare and implement the necessary action plans.
I can only say to my fellow Member who spoke on behalf of Párbeszéd [Dialogue for Hungary] that, although you’re questioning Balázs Orbán’s position, this would perhaps be more justified the other way round – since you’re the one who has left your party, and yet you’re still the leader of its parliamentary group. Congratulations, that’s a great achievement! It’s almost unprecedented, and everyone can envy your fantastic flexibility and eel-like manoeuvres! It is, I think, unprecedented in the history of the Hungarian parliament for someone to leave their party and still lead their party’s parliamentary group.
As for the Ukrainian–Russian war, that’s a more serious matter. I’d like to make it clear that, in my view, this is a war between two Slavic peoples, which we should avoid being involved in. Our only ambition is to work to ensure that this war doesn’t come a single metre closer to Hungary; because it poses a huge threat to Hungary, to the whole of Europe – and, given the arsenal of weapons that could be deployed, to the whole world. Therefore there must be negotiations, a ceasefire and advocacy for peace. I reject in the strongest terms Párbeszéd’s proposal to supply weapons and to enter the war with everything we have. On the contrary, I am proud that Hungary is a country that stands on the side of peace.
As far as cyber-attacks against foreign countries are concerned, I’d just like to say that there are a dozen of them every day, so let’s not make such a big deal of it. Hungary is under constant attack, we have to fend off a dozen or so cyber-attacks every day, and I hope that every day we’re doing so with more success rather than less.
Someone mentioned austerity. I’d like to inform you and make it clear that austerity is a socialist art form. This civic government, this national government, does not and will not apply austerity measures; it hasn’t done such a thing in the past, and it won’t do so in the future.
The point raised by my fellow Member Péter Ungár deserves a longer discussion, and the way I’m going to present it now might seem offensive. I apologise for this in advance, as offence isn’t intended. Perhaps if I were to explain it at greater length you’d understand the basis of my thinking, which is that I believe the approach you’re taking is in fact a dead end and will ultimately lead to servility. So, if we seek to derive Hungarian foreign policy from what we think about one or other of the world’s great powers, we’ll end up in a dead end. We must first define who we are, what our interests are, what we want, and what means we have to achieve these goals; everyone else is secondary. It’s not possible the other way round, because then you’ll be sitting backwards on the horse. So in general I don’t have a specific disagreement with you on certain foreign policy issues, although that may well be the case; but it’s simply that the philosophical foundations of our thinking on foreign policy are profoundly different. Perhaps this is why we have a different view of our relationship with the Americans. We, for example, don’t see ourselves as interfering in American elections at all, but we see them as interfering in Hungarian elections, and we’re trying very hard to bring this into some kind of balance; but we still have a lot of work to do to restore the balance. As to when the various assumptions of our European policy have worked and when they haven’t, it’s undoubtedly true that it’s difficult to achieve 100 per cent results here, but it’s unfair to judge us in complete opposition to the facts. So, when the Prime Minister of Luxembourg, Mr. Juncker, was elected President of the European Commission, two countries were opposed to him to the bitter end – two! These were the British, the United Kingdom – who were still in the EU then – and Hungary. Openly and to the bitter end. This was also the reason for my legendarily good relationship with the Commission President, who has since left office. We did this because Mr. Juncker’s programme announced the transformation of the hitherto politically neutral European Commission into a political body – that was his programme! We were convinced that if we adopted this the consequence would be that the British would leave the EU – and they did. And so we Central Europeans would be left without the British, at the mercy of Franco–German centralisation efforts, which we still find very difficult to defend ourselves against. This is why I never supported President Juncker. And I repeat: together with the then British prime minister we opposed his election to the bitter end.
I’d just like to tell my fellow Member Imre Komjáthi that I’d be careful with exaggerations about the functional illiteracy of young people leaving school. This is because these children are being taught, and the quality of the children leaving school is a reflection on the teachers. So be careful! So don’t think that we should disparage the performance of the entire Hungarian teaching profession, who spend years with these children. Some people claim that the results of this work are massively inadequate. This is not true! We have problems in the education system, but I must reject statements that would denigrate the work of Hungarian teachers in general.
With regard to the comment on health and education, here I must contradict you. This is because you used to be in government, and if you compare how much our government, the national government, has spent on health and education with how much you spent, then the unequal result comes out in our favour. You spent much less on both education and health than the current national government. I need only refer to the wage increases we implemented most recently in the health sector, the elimination of “gratitude payments”, and the pay rises for teachers in Hungary.
I’m sorry to have to get into an argument with you on another important issue in the world of work. I can understand that our fellow Members from an intellectual background, our fellow Members from an academic background, our fellow Members from an elite background, regularly talk about assembly plants as if they were beneath contempt. This is because they don’t know life. But I’m amazed that you speak in the same way as them! You talk about assembly plants as if they were something to be despised! Well, Honourable Member, I don’t think that there will ever be an economy in which only people in white coats will work, without any blue-collar workers in overalls and with oily hands; there will never be such an economy! Therefore assembly plants should not be despised. If there’s something worth talking about, it’s how we’re doing in research and development. But why should we contrast this with the factories that provide livelihoods to working people? Let’s be glad we have them! I’m sorry that I have to address a trade unionist in this tone of voice, but unfortunately – on behalf of the workers – I must reject what you say about assembly plants.
Turning to Mr. Toroczkai, I believe that his comment on the construction of reservoirs betrays a certain lack of knowledge. I suggest that you look at how many hundreds of billions of forints the Hungarian budget has spent on water conservation over the last fourteen years.
On behalf of the Government, I’d like to wish my honourable fellow Members an autumn session that continues better than it has started today.
Thank you very much.