Hungary’s biggest steelworks will go bankrupt?
DK lawmakers have demanded immediate government intervention to rescue troubled steelmaker ISD Dunaferr in Dunaújváros, in central Hungary.
László Kordás, deputy mayor of the city, told a press conference that “we are in the twelfth hour,” concerning the plant’s future. He called on the government to set up a fund to cover the full wages of the plant’s employees and payments to suppliers.
Zsolt Mezei, another deputy mayor of the city, said “it turned out last week that Dunaferr can only pay a part of the employees’ wages and it might turn out this week that the company has to be shut down for good”. He said Dunaferr, one of Hungary’s biggest industrial companies that employs some 4,500 people, was in “such a situation because the government has failed to provide any support”.
Read also The biggest Hungarian steelworks needs immediate governmental help
Socialists slam govt for ‘bypassing’ parliament in planned budget change
Leaving parliament out of the procedure of amending next year’s budget would be a “serious mistake”, the Socialist head of parliament’s budgetary committee said on Monday.
Speaking at an online press conference, Zoltán Vajda said the government was seeking to implement changes to the budget through decrees, whereas under the constitution such changes could only be adopted by parliament. He added that the government had not veered from that procedure “even during the (coronavirus pandemic) emergency”.
Vajda insisted that it had been obvious at the time of passing the budget that its main figures would change. He noted that it had been planned with inflation at 5.2 percent, economic growth of 4.1 percent, and with a forint-euro exchange rate of 372. However, inflation could reach 15 percent in 2023, the economy could contract rather than grow, while the euro is currently trading at 420 forints, he insisted.
Read alsoHungarian socialists demand to know content of extraordinary cabinet meeting
Source: MTI