Following a government conference on Tuesday, Minister of the Prime Minister’s Office János Lázár said that the main topic of the conference had been the strengthening of civic consolidation.
Minister Lázár said that at the conference – which is planned to become a regular event before the autumn session of Parliament every year – the Prime Minister had reviewed progress over the past year and the past five years through the prism of strengthening civic consolidation. In his closing remarks, Mr. Orbán had talked about the tasks to be carried out by the Cabinet by 2018, and about “the possibilities that 2018 offers us, if we wish to provide civic consolidation for everyone in Hungary in the long run”.
The Prime Minister had also noted that the ministers and ministers of state still have one more year to take the steps needed to reach the goals which have been set; quoting Mr. Orbán, Mr. Lázár said that 2017 and 2018 will be about the election. He also added that they had defined next year as the most important year of action.
The latest OECD report was discussed as part of a presentation by Ambassador to the OECD Zoltán Cséfalvay, while the Good State report by the National Public Service University was a topic of a presentation by the university’s dean, András Patyi. Minister Lázár noted that they are aware of critical points made by the OECD concerning the Hungarian education and health systems, but its recognition of what the Government had done between 2010 and 2014 for the economic consolidation of public finances are also well known.
Mr. Lázár pointed out that the OECD had also taken as its starting point the view that in 2010 Hungary was in a worse situation than Greece, and “the Greek scenario could have easily become reality too”. In contrast to this, however, Europe and the world today acknowledge the economic figures that Hungary has produced.
The following section of the conference saw presentations on the economy by: President of the Committee on the Budget Árpád Kovács; President of the State Audit Office of Hungary László Domonkos; President of the National Research, Development and Innovation Office József Pálinkás; and President of the Hungarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry László Parragh. They reported on how in the long term Hungary can sustain continuous economic growth, which, the Minister explained, is “the most important pillar of civic consolidation”. As examples of appropriate measures, he mentioned further reducing the country’s sovereign debt, significantly increasing innovation, the Hungarian economy “joining the third industrial revolution” and further strengthening a work-based society.
Prime-ministerial Commissioner György Grasznói gave a presentation on the past, present and future prospects of people rising to the middle class, while Head of the Central Statistical Office Gabriella Vukovics talked about social processes in progress since 2010.
The Minister of the Prime Minister’s Office said that, in addition to the above, the Prime Minister had asked Minister for National Economy Mihály Varga and Minister of Human Capacities Zoltán Balog to comment.
In summary, he said that in many ways the presentations were in line with each other – for example, they all said that in the coming period, losses to Hungarian enterprises caused by state bureaucracy can no longer be disregarded.
In response to a question on the larger wave of migrants expected to arrive from Serbia on Wednesday, the Minister said that the Prime Minister had convened the Committee on National Security for Tuesday night.
The Minister did not comment on an article in the Hungarian weekly Figyelő, which claimed that he was intending to retire from politics. “For now, I have a lot to do, and I do not have the time to deal with such things”, he said.
(Prime Minister's Office/MTI)
