home purchase subsidies

DK calls for doubling family allowance

The leftist opposition Democratic Coalition (DK) has said it will submit to parliament a bill on doubling family allowances.

At a press conference on Monday, DK group spokesman Zsolt Gréczy noted that the government had decided to double Hungarian President János Áder’s 1.5 million forint (EUR 4,480) salary based on the argument that the head of state’s salary had been stagnant for 10 years.

Today a family raising one child receives a monthly family allowance of 12,200 forints, Gréczy said, insisting that this sum was “barely enough to cover a bigger pack of diapers”.

“Yet President Áder will be getting an extra 1.5 million forints a month,” he added.

“The Fidesz government is not pro-family because it would rather double the million-forint salary of its partisan soldier than give an extra 10,000 forints to families,” Gréczy said.

Asked about the government’s family protection action plan, Gréczy said those measures had “failed”. He argued that there were many who could not avail of the family support scheme dubbed CSOK, adding that many of those who did were unaware that the loan had to be paid back.

November 19, 2019

OECD forecasts Hungarian economic growth of 3.9 pc this year

The OECD has stuck to its forecast of Hungarian economic growth of 3.9 percent this year.

The projection in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development‘s biannual forecast released on Tuesday is below the government’s 4 percent target. The OECD reckons growth will be 3 percent next year.

Private consumption remains strong, helped by rising real incomes and high consumer confidence coupled with supportive macroeconomic policies, the report said.

Investment growth is “buoyant”, supported by EU funding, housing subsidy schemes and expanding production capacity, it added.

Hungary’s “strong recovery is an opportunity to introduce measures to improve fiscal sustainability, reduce old-age poverty and address access challenges in the pension and health system”, the OECD said. “Bolstering domestic SMEs should focus on improving business regulation, facilitating their integration into regional and national supply chains, and upgrading skills,” the report added.

Commenting on the report, Gábor Gion, state secretary for financial policy affairs, said the OECD’s forecast confirmed that

Hungary was one of the most dynamically growing European Union member states.

The document highlights the favourable effects of the government’s economic policy, including wage increases thanks to a six-year wage agreement and home subsidies which boost domestic demand, he added. The OECD’s forecast of 3.9 percent is close to the government target and Hungary’s growth will exceed the average growth of OECD members, as well as the EU average, Gion said.

May 21, 2019

Orbán cabinet: Hungarian family support policy is seen as a model

The Hungarian government’s family support policy is seen as a model and “a reference point” to be followed, Katalin Novák, the state secretary of the human resources ministry, said on Tuesday, summing up the recent 13th World Congress of Families in Verona.

Participants at the congress were primarily interested in learning about the scheme’s financing mechanism, Novák told public news channel M1, adding she had outlined the package of family support measures that parliament passed on Monday.

These include granting an interest-free general purpose loan up to 10 million forints (EUR 31,100) to married couples who commit to having children and expanding the preferential home purchase subsidy scheme to include resale homes.

The measures also include partially exempting families from mortgage repayments after the birth of their first child and granting up to 2.5 million forints for purchases of new, seven-passenger vehicles for families with at least three children.

The bill on personal income tax exemption for women with four children and payments to grandparent who undertake child care is expected to come before parliament in the second half of the year, she said, adding that the development of nurseries is ongoing.

She noted that the government will launch an information and awareness campaign the familiarise the general public with the measures.

In a separate interview, the state secretary told public broadcaster Kossuth Radio that

“I want to give as much support as possible to those in Hungary who are on the cusp of undertaking parenthood and to carers, as well as to families with up to two children.”

As regards the scheme’s financing, Novák said the diligence of Hungarians had provided its foundations, noting that the number of employed has risen by one million since 2010.

April 2, 2019

Two-thirds back PM Orbán’s family support scheme – Survey

Two-thirds of survey respondents interviewed after Prime Minister Viktor Orbán announced new family assistance measures approved of them, according to the Nézőpont Institute.

Fully 63 percent of 541 people surveyed expressed satisfaction with the planned measures, Nézőpont said in a statement on Monday. Also 40 percent of people identifying with the opposition backed them.

Nézőpont also said that the government’s anti-migration stance was met with “a consensus at least as broad”, with 64 percent of the respondents against the European Union “revisiting mandatory migrant quotas” after the upcoming European parliamentary elections.

In a survey of 500 people conducted by the Századvég Foundation, 73 percent of respondents expressed a favourable opinion of the prime minister’s state-of-the-nation address, as well as the family assistance measures he outlined in the speech.

ORBÁN STATE-OF-THE NATION ADDRESS IN BUDAPEST – HERE ARE THE SURPRISING ANNOUNCEMENTS!

Fully 57 percent expressed a favourable view of the speech and 16 percent were somewhat positive, whereas only 19 percent were negative, according to the survey.

Among the seven new family benefits, a three-year programme to expand creche places drew the largest support, with 94 percent of respondents approving of the measure.

Fully 92 percent welcomed the expansion of the preferential loan for family home purchases (csok), while 88 percent supported payments to grandparents who help with child care. Eighty-seven percent welcomed support for large families making mortgage repayments.

Altogether 84 percent of respondents approved of the planned preferential loan of 10 million forints (EUR 31,500) for newly-weds. Fully 78 percent approved of personal income tax exemptions for women who raise at least four children and 77 percent backed a subsidy for large families purchasing a bigger vehicle.

Fully 93 percent approved of the prime minister’s message that support for Hungarian families raising children was the best response to population decline as opposed to migration. Also,

60 percent agreed with the proposition that the upcoming European parliamentary elections would decide whether or not the pro-immigration policies of Brussels could be stopped.

February 13, 2019

Orbán cabinet family subsidy package to cost EUR 472m a year

State secretary for family policy Katalin Novák has said the family support measures unveiled by the prime minister on Sunday will cost the central budget about 150 billion forints (EUR 472m) a year.

This year, the fiscal impact of the measures are expected to be half that amount, Novák told a press conference on Monday.

She noted that the 10 million forint loan (EUR 31,500) available to women committed to having children would be available from July 1, 2019. Women between the ages of 18 and 40, in their first marriage, who have worked for at least three years are eligible for the loan which will be interest free, she added.

Csok loans will become available for the purchase of resale homes from July 1, 2019, she said.

A 35 million forint cap on the value of resale homes for which families with children may apply for csok subsidies will be scrapped, she added.

The personal income tax exemption for women with four or more children is expected to be introduced from 2020, Novák said. The exemption will apply only to earned income, not to dividends, she added.

Payments to grandparents for carrying out child care will only apply if they are not yet pensioners and if they take child care leave, she said.

The 2.5 million forint subsidy for the purchase of large passenger cars may cover at most half of the cost of the vehicle, she added.

As we wrote before, the opposition Socialists said new family policy measures announced by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán on Sunday would only benefit the wealthy and they constituted a government attempt “to cover up the failure of the slave law”, read more HERE.

February 12, 2019

Jobbik criticises government family support measures

The opposition Jobbik party criticised on Monday recently flagged government measures to expand its family housing subsidy scheme (csok), saying tens of thousands of rich families would benefit from the move, while hundreds of thousands of poor ones would miss out.

Referring to Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s announcement of the measures on Sunday, Jobbik‘s deputy leader accused the government of driving a wedge through society “by benefitting 37,000 people and neglecting several hundred thousand others”.

He said the subsidy scheme had no upper limit, and large houses “in the hundred million forint range” could also be built using public money.

Dániel Z. Kárpát told a press conference that the package of measures should have included help for people who rent. He also called for a review of banking practices with the aim of targeting help at troubled mortgage holders rather than providing a subsidy for new borrowers.

The announced benefits include exempting women who raise at least four children from personal income tax for life, giving large families 2.5 million forints (EUR 7,860) to buy a large vehicle and a cheap loan of 10 million forints for women under age 40 who marry for the first time, with a sliding scale of repayment depending on how many children she bears.

ORBÁN STATE-OF-THE NATION ADDRESS IN BUDAPEST – HERE ARE THE SURPRISING ANNOUNCEMENTS!

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán announced a seven-point family protection action plan in his state-of-the-nation address in Budapest on Sunday.

February 12, 2019

Socialists: New family policy measures only benefit wealthy

The opposition Socialists said new family policy measures announced by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán on Sunday would only benefit the wealthy and they constituted a government attempt “to cover up the failure of the slave law”.

Referring to recent legislation on overtime, dubbed “slave law”, Socialist lawmaker Lajos Korozs told a press conference that the ruling Fidesz party had come to realise that the law was bad move, leading to the potential loss of some 500,000 voters.

So now they are making big promises, Korozs, who is head of parliament’s welfare committee, said. But in reality they won’t help the majority of people, he said.

The Socialist politician insisted that “oligarchs and the wives of the ruling Fidesz elite” would not only be exempt from personal income tax but they would reap even more public money on top of that.

The expansion of creche places to 18,000 and the establishment of creches in every village throughout Hungary were promises already made in the previous government term, he said. Of 18,000 places, only one thousand places have been created, and it will be impossible to fulfil the new promise to create 70,000 places by 2021, he added.

Meanwhile, Korozs said the planned 10 million forint loan would push people into a debt trap since it would take a family 17 years to pay it back based on monthly instalments of 50,000 forints (EUR 160).

Commenting on the expansion of the family housing loan scheme (csok), he said this would actually offer an investment portfolio to high-income people, enabling them to buy a second or third home. Last time the eligibility criteria for csok was expanded, property prices grew drastically, followed by an increase in rents, he added.

Referring to the planned 2.5 million forint subsidy for the purchase of seven-seater vehicles, Korozs said such vehicles cost 11-13 million forints, meaning families would still have to fork out 10 million forints.

In response, the Fidesz parliamentary group said in a statement that the Socialists attacked the government’s family protection action plan while voting in support of migration in the European Parliament.

“The Socialists haven’t changed at all,” the statement said. “When in government, all they could do was to take aid away from families with children and in opposition they have never supported family benefit programmes,” it added.

February 12, 2019

Orbán state-of-the nation address in Budapest – Here are the surprising announcements!

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán announced a seven-point family protection action plan in his state-of-the-nation address in Budapest on Sunday.

Family protection action plan

“This is Hungary’s answer [to challenges[, rather than immigration,” the prime minister said.

Listing the points of the action plan, Orbán said

every woman under 40 years of age will be eligible to a preferential loan when they first get married.

The preferential loan of the family home purchase scheme (CSOK) will be extended; families raising two or more children will now also be able to use it for purchasing resale homes. The government will repay 1 million forints of the mortgage loan of families with two or more children. This measure was first announced in August 2017 for families with three or more children, with the government paying off 1 million forints of families’ mortgages for every third and subsequent child from January 2018. The measures has now been extended to include families raising two children.

Women who have had and raised at least four children will be exempt from personal income tax payment for the rest of their lives.

The government will launch a car purchase subsidy programme for large families. Families raising at least three children will be eligible to a grant of 2.5 million forints (8,000 euros) to buy a new car seating at least seven people.

The government will create 21,000 creche places over three years. Grandparents will also be eligible to a child-care fee and look after young children instead of the parents, the prime minister added.

HUNGARIAN POPULATION DECREASING WHILE THE NUMBER OF FOREIGNERS INCREASING

‘Hungarians have worked hard for achievements’

“Neither the third two-thirds majority, nor the outstanding economic growth were given to us as a present, Hungarians have worked hard for both,” Prime Minister Orbán said.

In his traditional state-of-the-nation address, the prime minister said

politics and the economy are deeply related and the achievements “can never be attributed to blind luck alone”.

Orbán noted that in 2009, towards the end of left-wing rule, “our shared assets, reserves and future possibilities had all been used up”. Hungary needed more than just crisis management, it needed a complete renewal, a new direction, he said.

Today, the number of marriages is increasing, infant mortality has been reduced, employment has grown from 55 percent to 70 percent, unemployment has been reduced to one-third of its earlier level, incomes are growing, and the minimum wage has more than doubled, he said.

Thanks to the joint efforts of the past ten years, Hungarians have faith in their future again, Orbán said.

“For us, victory is not when our party wins but when it is our country that is victorious,” the prime minister said.

Orbán said Hungary is a place where everyone will benefit from being Hungarian, and step by step, with persistent hard work, “we will eliminate poverty”. He said everyone will have work and home, every child will have access to creche, kindergarten, school, school dinners and textbooks, there will be support for young people, and a respectable old age for seniors.

Orbán calls Brussels ‘citadel of new internationalism’

PM Orbán called Brussels “the citadel of new internationalism” and immigration as “the instrument of this internationalism”.

Giving his traditional state-of-the-nation address on Sunday, Orbán said there are once again forces that want to see open societies and a world without nations, “fabricate” a supranational global government and are still controlled from abroad.

“The target countries for migrants are witnessing the emergence of a Christian-Muslim world with a shrinking rate of Christians.

But we, central Europeans, still have a future of our own,” Orbán said.

Orbán calls opposition “bunch of pro-immigration politicians”

PM Orbán called the Hungarian opposition “a bunch of pro-immigration politicians who are kept on a respirator by George Soros and the EU bureaucrats”.

Giving his traditional state-of-the-nation address on Sunday, Orbán said “it is a kind of political pornography” that the Socialists and the extreme right have formed a coalition.

“We have to hear that listing MPs of Jewish origin is not anti-Semitism and he who says this wants to become mayor of Budapest instead of sneaking away. We can only say that this is a shame,” Orbán said.

OPPOSITION PARTIES CRITICISE ORBÁN’S STATE-OF-THE-NATION ADDRESS

Speakers at a joint demonstration of the opposition parties criticised Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s state-of-the-nation address and challenged him on the state of democracy in Budapest on Sunday. Read more HERE.

February 10, 2019

More than 80pc of Hungarians support government family policy

Eight out of ten Hungarians are in favour of the government’s family support policy solutions, according to a fresh survey by pollster Nezopont published on Saturday.

The survey was conducted in November 2018, based on telephone interviews with 1,000 people.

The results show that 81 percent of respondents agree with placing family policy into focus, 68 percent support the government’s family home purchase subsidy scheme and 69 percent are in favour of giving more support to families.

The institute said the family home purchase subsidy scheme is appreciated not only by large families; 67 percent of respondents younger than 18 years and 74 percent of families with a single child consider it a commendable initiative.

Advocating a turnaround of demographic trends can be considered a non-partisan cause as a significant majority of both left-wing and right-wing voters agree with increasing support for families, Nézőpont said.

February 10, 2019

Hungarian government prioritises family support policy, says finance ministry state secretary

Hungary’s government does not believe in immigration, but rather in supporting Hungarian families raising children, finance ministry state secretary András Tállai said in an interview published in Saturday’s issue of Magyar Idők, on the occasion that the government has expanded its CSOK home purchase subsidy programme.

Even more families will become eligible for a substantial amount of support, Tállai said. The head of the Prime Minister’s Office announced last week that the government had decided to raise the home purchase subsidies available for families raising two children to 10 million forints (EUR 31,000) and the credit limit for families with three children will be raised to 15 million forints.

Tállai said “children are a priority for this government, we want to provide as much help as possible to make life easier for families raising children.”

“Everyone should be aware that it is our shared interest to increase the number of children,” he added. It is important for the whole of Hungarian society to stop the population decline as a broader group of active population is required for the Hungarian economy to continue growing over the coming years and decades and to ensure that the Hungarian society of the future — including pensioners — can enjoy adequate living standards,” Tállai said.

Since the CSOK home subsidy scheme was launched in 2015, applications from almost 90,000 families have been accepted, for a combined 257 billion forints of funding.

November 4, 2018

Upgraded CSOK home purchase subsidy programme could attract twice as many, says expert

The government’s recently expanded CSOK home purchase subsidy programme could double the number of participants, a real estate expert told public television M1 on Thursday.

László Balogh said that the programme offered “safe and predictable” loans for 25 years, and added that the preferential 3 percent interest was just half of the current market rates. He said that the recent changes to the scheme would also boost home construction as higher sales would increase both supply and demand.

As we wrote, the head of the Prime Minister’s Office announced last week that the government had decided to raise the home purchase subsidies available for families raising two children to 10 million forints (EUR 31,000).

Earlier the HUF 10m loans were available only to families with three or more children.

The credit limit for families with three children will be raised to 15 million forints (EUR 45,000), Gergely Gulyás said.

[button link=”https://dailynewshungary.com/annual-dynamics-of-house-prices-in-budapest-grows/” type=”big” color=”orange” newwindow=”yes”] ANNUAL DYNAMICS OF HOUSE PRICES IN BUDAPEST GROWS[/button]

November 2, 2018

Hungarian government to expand home purchase subsidies – Regular press briefing

The government has decided to raise the home purchase subsidies (CSOK) available for families raising two children to 10 million forints (EUR 31,000), the head of the Prime Minister’s Office said on Thursday at a regular press briefing.

CSOK

Earlier the HUF 10m loans were available only to families with three or more children.

The credit limit for families with three children will be raised to 15 million forints (46,500 euros), Gergely Gulyás said.

The funds freed when the government decided to phase out state subsidies to home savings accounts earlier this month will be regrouped to support the CSOK system, Gulyás said.

The government aims to implement the new regulations this year, Gulyás said.

Further measures regarding family home subsidies will be decided after the government’s planned national consultation survey on the subject. Decisions on the survey will be announced later this week, Gulyás said.

The government is mulling extending the preferential 5 percent VAT on home purchases, which was set to conclude by the end of the year, Gulyas said.

Meanwhile, Gulyás announced that

Budapest will have four central hospitals instead of the three planned earlier.

The four main hospitals will be the Honvédkórház, the Szent János Hospital, an integrated institution comprising the Szent Laszló and Szent István hospitals, as well as a new hospital being built in south Buda.

Gulyás also announced that the government will revise the system of culture subsidies paid as corporate tax into the central budget, commonly dubbed “tao”. The current system has led to “a major abuse of loopholes”, Gulyas said. The government does not intend to cut the current tao funding allocated for culture, which was around 35 billion forints, Gulyas said. Rather, it aims for a transparent grants system overseen by the culture ministry, he said.

The tao funding will not be distributed based on political considerations, “although it will doubtless lead to political debates”, Gulyas said.

Gulyás rejected reports that spectators were bussed in to see Prime Minister Viktor Orbán deliver his speech on the October 23 national holiday on Tuesday. “The proliferation of fake news regarding the issue is due to the fact that government commemorations draw about ten times as many viewers as opposition events do,” he said.

Government spokesman Zoltán Kovács noted that the heightened security measures at the commemoration were in line with the usual procedures at events attended by high-level politicians.

As we wrote a week ago, the Hungarian parliament voted to phase out the state subsidy on deposits with home savings banks, read more HERE.

Government steps up border control in South Hungary

Gergely Gulyás, citing interior ministry information, said the migrants were some 70kms south of the country. Hungary has offered Croatia help in handling the migrants, he added.

Meanwhile, he said national immigration and citizenship office will be renamed the office in charge of foreign nationals “to reflect the wish of Hungarian voters that the country should not become a migrant destination”. The structure of the authority will not change but “renaming it sends a clear message that migration is a law enforcement issue”, he added.

On the topic of Hungary-Ukraine ties, Gulyás said the government strove for good neighbourly relations but “this is not possible if prospects and opportunities for Ukraine’s ethnic Hungarians narrow rather than expand”. He said it was regrettable that Ukraine was using the “Hungarian card” in its election campaign. Hungary will “speak up for Transcarpathia Hungarians” in all possible forums, he added.

Asked about the government’s rejection of plan to appoint a European prosecutor, Gulyás said the initiative would “curb national sovereignty”.

Concerning Budapest’s Central European University, Gulyás said, “We consider any threats or offers by the CEU as political bluff by George Soros”.

The government cannot be blamed if the CEU decides to open an campus in Vienna “to issue degrees”,

he said, noting that the law on higher education contains provisions for issuing joint degrees such as Hungarian-American ones.

On the topic of health care, Gulyas said “health care is not a business”. “Public health services must be guaranteed to all taxpayers and pensioners”. He added, however, that the government has “never restricted anyone’s right to buy a supplementary health insurance policy or to buy private health-care services”.

Answering a question about reports of planned layoffs of 17-18 percent of public sector employees, Gulyas said he had briefed union heads about the plans amid a “very constructive atmosphere”. He said 10 percent of the jobs in question would be scrapped and actual lay-offs would not exceed 10 percent. “This is in line the government’s position that there should be no blanket layoffs.” He added those retaining their positions would benefit from an average 30 percent pay rise on Jan. 1.

Government mulls appeal of ICSID voucher decision

Hungary’s government is weighing legal redress in the matter of a decision by the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) awarding compensation to French voucher company Le Cheque Dejeuner, Gulyás said.

“We are examining the possibilities of legal appeal,” Gulyás said when asked to comment on the ICSID’s decision.

The former Socialist government “made a mistake” when they gave a French company the opportunity to profit from Hungarians’ recreation and vacations, he added.

Hungary rolled out a unified national voucher system in 2011, effectively squeezing out existing market players. In 2016, the European Court of Justice ruled that the voucher system violated key European Union tenets, discriminating against or restricting the freedom of establishment and the freedom to provide services.

October 25, 2018

Bill would phase out subsidy on home savings bank deposits

A bill submitted by a Fidesz MP seeks to phase out the state subsidy on deposits with home savings banks.

Erik Bánki, the bill’s sponsor, said on Monday, said the subsidy on the home savings bank deposits, 30 percent up to 72,000 (EUR 222) forints a year, had not effectively served its purpose of supporting home construction recently, while home savings banks had pocketed “extra profit”.

Existing contracts are unaffected by the bill and subsidies on these will be paid until the deposits mature, he added.

Bánki, who heads Parliament’s economy committee, said in the justification of the bill that the subsidised home savings bank deposits had become “inefficient” and “dear to the state and the taxpayer”. Deposits in home savings banks account for just one-third of all state-subsidised savings, but they eat up three-quarters of total state subsidies on savings, he noted.

“Because of the typically small amount [saved] in the construction, few homes are built from the savings. In a number of cases, the savings don’t event got to home purchases, because they can also be used for the construction of a swimming pool or a sauna when the contract matures,” Bánki said.

Without the subsidies, expected to reach more than 70 billion forints this year, the yield on deposits in home savings banks would be negative, he said.

At the same time, home savings banks are padding their pockets, booking almost 60 billion in extra profits since 2010, he added.

Bánki noted that more than 90,000 Hungarian families have made use of 250 billion forints in grants in the framework of the Home Purchase Subsidy Scheme for Families with children, known by its Hungarian acronym “CSOK”, since the groundwork was laid for the programme late in 2015.

October 15, 2018

Visegrád Four ministers discuss support for families

balog visegrád group poland czech family

Economic development should go hand in hand with providing support for families, Human Resources Minister Zoltán Balog told a panel discussion of his Visegrád Four counterparts held within a conference dubbed “Strong families for a strong Europe” in Budapest on Wednesday.

Balog said that “now that central Europe has become the engine driving European development it is crucial that families should benefit from that development”. The minister also said that while increasing the number of births is important, having children “in a responsible way” is also crucial. He added that “an increase in the appreciation and reputation of marriage has been the greatest achievement of recent years”.

Concerning the economy, Balog noted that low wages greatly contributed to Hungary being an attractive destination for investors. He insisted that “since low wages support competitiveness, wages cannot be increased quickly” but other conditions, such as accommodation, must be improved, and mentioned, for example, the government’s first home buyer programme.

Elzbieta Rafalska, Poland’s family and labour minister, said that

demographic problems cannot be resolved through immigration but a higher number of births, and added that her government ensures “unconditional” support to all families.

She mentioned Hungary’s family policy as a reference, and said that Poland has “learnt a lot” from the Hungarian government.

Jana Hanzlíková, Czech deputy minister for social policy, talked about an ageing Czech society, and said that her government was making efforts to ensure that “children grow up in well-functioning families” in which the parents can match work and private life.

Slovakia’s Boris Ondrus, state secretary for labour and welfare, said that running efficient family support mechanisms was a priority for his government, with special regard to providing incentives for young people to have children. The Slovak measures are aimed at ensuring that “having children does not result in a deficit in the family budget”, he said.

featured image: mti

March 29, 2018

Orbán: The achievements of the past 8 years are at risk in the April election

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán gave warning in an interview to local broadcaster in the east of the country on Monday that his Fidesz government’s achievements over the past eight years were at risk in the upcoming general election.

Orbán told Nyíregyháza Television that “the joint success of the government and the people” must be protected on April 8.

He said Hungarians were traditionally a pessimistic people, “but we are now overcoming this”.

“We never believed we could have our own future and we always confronted big plans with: ‘we’ll believe when we see it’. This mentality has changed since 2010 thanks to hard work … Hungarians see the country is developing,” he said.

Orbán pointed to improving macroeconomic and budget data, adding that construction, the development of industrial parks, sports halls, the renewal of cities, and home-building opportunities were clear to see.

Surveys show that Hungary is among the few countries in Europe today where people feel that their children will lead better lives than their parents.

“This is a spiritual turning point, namely building confidence for the future, which is what I regard as the most important endeavour and this is what we have been doing in the past eight years,” Orbán said.

“That Hungarians are expecting something in the future is down to our common successes … this must be protected and this is what is at stake,” he said.

featured image: MTI

March 13, 2018

House building permit issues up more than 20 pc in 2017

The number of house building permits issued in Hungary in 2017 rose by an annual 20.4 percent to 37,997, the Central Statistical Office (KSH) said on Friday.

The number of house building permits issued in Budapest increased by 56.3 percent to 14,632. In small towns and villages, the number climbed by 26.6 percent to 5,487. In county seats and cities with over 50,000 residents, the number of building permits was down 9 percent from a high base, at 8,151.

Late 2015, Hungarian lawmakers lowered the VAT rate on home construction from 27 percent to 5 percent and eased rules for obtaining building permits.

Around the same time, the government launched a home purchase subsidy scheme for families with children.

The number of completed houses rose by 44 percent to 14,389 for the whole country and was down 0.6 percent from a high base of 2,761 in Budapest.

February 23, 2018

Large families make up one-fifth of CSOK applications

Families with three or more children account for one-fifth of applications for the government’s home purchase subsidy scheme for families (CSOK), the daily Magyar Idők said on Wednesday.

The government launched the scheme which awards subsidies and preferential credit for home purchases to families with children late in 2015. Large families are eligible for grants up to 10 million forints (EUR 32,000) as well as preferential loans. They have been awarded 104 billion forints in CSOK grants so far, or 56 percent of the 184 billion total, the Economy Ministry told the paper.

Application numbers for the scheme have risen each year, climbing from 10,400 in 2015 to almost 26,000 in 2016, and about 30,000 in 2017.

Of the applications submitted since the start of 2016, almost two-thirds were for the purchase of resale homes and one-third were for new homes. Due to the higher price of new homes, the latter applications accounted for 68 percent of the subsidies awarded. A fraction of applications were for extensions to existing homes.

February 7, 2018

Socialists call for basic public utilities package

The opposition Socialists propose introducing a basic package for public utilities, including water, gas and electricity supplies, to reduce the burden of consumers, lawmaker Ildikó Borbély Bangó said on Monday.

The proposed package would include providing one cubic metre of drinking water at a symbolic fee, plus 15 cubic metres of natural gas and 30 kilowatts of electricity at half of the current price each month, she told a press conference. The package would be made available to all Hungarian citizens at their permanent address, she added.

Criticising ruling Fidesz, Borbély Bangó said that

since public utility service providers were put into state ownership, the government has increased utility prices for at least 1.5 million people.

In 2005 when the world market price of oil was 50 dollars/barrel, the price of natural gas amounted to 50 forints (EUR 0.16) per cubic metre in Hungary. At present, the price of is oil stagnating at 65-70 dollar on the world market but the price of gas is 101 forints in Hungary, she said.

The Socialists’ proposal would allow a 32 percent decrease in the price of gas and a 10 percent decrease in both electricity and district heating prices, the lawmaker said.

Borbély Bangó said the Socialists had repeatedly proposed in parliament to cut utility fees but even ruling Fidesz’s commissioner in charge of reducing public utility fees, Szilárd Németh, had rejected it nine times.

January 15, 2018