Former Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister in Donald Tusk’s government, Jan Vincent Rostowski, was a guest of editor Bogdan Rymanowski on Radio Zet’s morning broadcast and stated that if the PO returned to power, money would be available this time for social programs.
How the Tusk government was looking for money
Let’s not forget that in 2014, when Donald Tusk was still Prime Minister, and Law and Justice announced the “Family 500 plus” program in preparation for the parliamentary elections in the autumn of 2015, he claimed that there was not that much money in the budget for its implementation.
He even made an inappropriate joke when he was with the mountain rescuers in Zakopane that they are probably not “buried” here because if he found them anywhere he would be the luckiest man in the world who could pay them to families who have children to raise. .
In 2015, then Prime Minister Ewa Kopacz spoke in a similar manner, claiming that the implementation of such a program would burst public finances and put Poland in the situation of an insolvent Greece.
In turn, on election night in October 2015, just after the announcement of the election results and the victory of Law and Justice, the aforementioned Jan Vincent Rostowski used in such a way that it will have an absolute majority in the Sejm, the famous statement about the implementation of the election promises of Law and Justice “there is no money and there won’t be”.
Funds for social programs
Nearly eight years of Law and Justice rule has clearly shown that money in the budget – in much larger amounts than before – can appear, you just need to take firm action against interest groups that “privatize” taxes – including VAT mafias.
Let us remind you that the VAT gap, which was almost 25 percent at the end of 2015. potential revenue from this tax was only 4.3% at the end of 2021, and the VAT revenue included in the 2023 budget will exceed PLN 286 billion, which is almost as much as all budget revenue (fiscal and non-fiscal income). ) ) in 2015 (amounted to PLN 289.1 billion).
In turn, all planned budget revenues for 2023 exceed PLN 604 billion and expenditures exceed PLN 670 billion, so in both cases they are more than twice the budget revenues and expenditures in 2015.
So under the rule of the United Right there is money after all, more than PLN 213 billion was spent on the 500 plus program for almost 7 years until December 2022, and so much money from this program went to families raising children.
On the other hand, almost PLN 115 billion was spent on pension increases, as well as on the 13th and 14th pension alone in the years 2022-2023, more than PLN 44 billion in 2022 and, based on preliminary calculations, at least PLN 70 billion this year.
In addition, the opposition’s allegations that the United Right finances social programs by indebting the state are untrue. Public debt-to-GDP ratio at the end of 2022 was lower than at the end of the PO-PSL government and stood at 50, 3 percent. while at the end of 2015 it was no less than 51.3 percent.
PO program
Rostowski, edited by Rymanowski, claimed that if the PO returns to power now, there will be money not only for the Family 500 plus program, but even for 0 percent home loans promised by Tusk. and rent subsidies of PLN 600 per month, although the cost of this project, if implemented, would amount to at least several tens of billion zlotys in the coming years.
However, we remember very well how the leading politicians of the PO approach election promises “loosely”.
The aforementioned Jan Vincent Rostowski, as well as Radosław Sikorski, heard “Sowa i friends” (so painfully sincere) in the restaurant, “joking” in reference to election promises, “promising twice is keeping once”, or “binding political promises only those who believe in it.
It was probably based on this approach that Rostowski, Rymanowski’s editor, affirmed that when the PO comes back to power, there will be money not only for 500 plus, but also for zero-interest home loans.
Source: wPolityce