Orbán: Government ready to work with cooperative local councils – UPDATE

The government is ready to “cooperate with all mayors and local councils that are themselves ready to cooperate,” Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in parliament’s opening autumn session on Monday.

Referring to the recent local elections, Orbán said that “everybody, regardless of party affiliation, must work for Hungary and the Hungarian people.” “The nation cannot be in opposition,” he added.

Concerning the election results, Orbán said it was “a great honour” for the ruling parties to have captured over 50 percent of votes nationwide. This equals an endorsement of the government’s major policies, he said, enumerating among them a work-based and pro-family economy, higher wages, help for young people to buy or renovate homes and national cohesion.

He said the government had “lived up to its responsibilities in terms of organising and conducting the election to the satisfaction of the public” and thanked voters who took part in the elections, thereby “contributing to the functioning of Hungarian democracy”. “Hungarians are still committed to democracy and believe in Hungary’s future,” he said.

Orbán said

the government’s family protection action plan was gaining momentum, with more than 65,000 people having joined the scheme.

Altogether, 650 billion forints (EUR 1.96bn) of funding has been channelled towards families, he added.

The economy has responded positively to this policy, he said, recording growth of 5.2 percent in the first half.

“We switched to a job-based economy and the unemployment rate has dropped to 3.4 percent, while the number of jobs has increased by 808,000 since 2010,” he said,

adding that 4.5 million people have jobs in the country. Orbán said nevertheless the government “wants more and better”, and intends to catch up with the Czech Republic in this regard.

The prime minister said that in the first seven months of the year average wages had increased by 10.6 percent, while the rise in the minimum wage was the fourth highest in the EU.

Orbán also noted big changes in government debt, which has fallen to 68 percent to GDP. And whereas in 2010 foreign currency loans accounted for 50 percent of the total, today they stand below 20 percent, he added.

Regarding the EU, Orbán said the incoming president of the European Commission was someone who could remedy the mistakes of previous years. He said he had felt obliged to prevent the election of a commission head who spoke disrespectfully of Hungarians, and who wanted to implement plans contrary to the will of Hungarians on migration. “We have achieved our goal,” he said.

On the topic of Brexit, Orbán said “a fair and just agreement” for the British had been made for their departure from the bloc. Also, an agreement had been struck that would protect the interests of Hungarians working in Britain.