Orban: Job-Creation, Education Reform Main Focus

Budapest, October 19 (MTI) – Among the main goals of the government going forward are achieving full employment by 2018 and reforming the public education system, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said in a speech, ahead of the submission of the 2015 budget to parliament on Monday.

“On the horizon is a health spirited, successful people…” Orban said in a 20 minute speech held in the Millennium Park on Sunday, in which he also assessed the Fidesz party’s sweeping victory in the recent local elections.

Orban said there were 178,000 people — as opposed to over 500,000 in 2010 — who were still living on benefits. This fact, he added, shows that there will be more jobs in the future if Fidesz governs the country. He said these people would be put into work and taken off benefits by 2018, and “modern European industrial centres” would be created in place of the one-time Socialist industrial towns.

On the topic of education, he said his government planned to create “Europe’s best school system” in the next few years, “with the support of the economy minister”.

He told the audience of local mayors and representatives not to be “tempted by cynicism”.

“You have five years to see through your work; this is a state of grace,” he told them. “Go Hungary, Go Hungarians!”, he added.

Reacting to Orban’s speech, the Socialists said that Hungary is not only home to Fidesz supporters but to the 6 million voters who did not cast their ballots for the ruling party. Zoltan Gogos, the party’s deputy chairman, said the country also belonged to those citizens who have “escaped abroad and escaped from poverty at home”. Not only do jobless people get into the vicinity of privation but so do people who work but cannot earn more than 65,000 forints (EUR 212) each month, he said.

Photo: MTI – Szilard Koszticsak

Source: http://mtva.hu/hu/hungary-matters