Orbán said poverty in Hungary was falling while the middle class were growing. Rural developments now receive three times what the previous government spent, he added.
You can find the previous parts of Viktor Orbán’s speech HERE (part 1) and HERE (part 2).
He said a work-based economy generated money for spending. With more jobs and higher incomes, he added, taxes could be maintained at a low level, freeing up disposable income for people to consume and invest.
The prime minister said that but for global inflation, the economy would have performed even better.
But the government had kept a lid on inflation by introducing caps on the price of fuel, household utilities, interest on loans and basic foods. Family benefits, he said, would be expanded.
On the subject of the pandemic, the prime minister said Hungary had been “the first to wake up” and take measures such as forming an operative body dedicated to handling the virus, purchasing ventilators, and readying hospitals in time. Hungary was also head of the queue for procuring vaccines and the “the first to reopen the country”.
Orbán said his government had settled the salaries of doctors, abolished gratuities paid by patients, and separated private from public health care under an agreement with the Hungarian Chamber of Doctors.
Thanks to developments in the health-care industry and the domestic production of masks, ventilators and medical aids, “we’re now producing what we … may need during another epidemic,” he said.
On the subject of migration, Orbán said every day hundreds of people were attempting to force their way into Hungary. Last year 122,000 made the attempt while more than 12,000 have done so in January this year alone, he said.
The border, he said, would only be protected “as long as the current government holds power”.
Referring to “pro-migrant bureaucrats in Brussels” and the “dangerous actors of the Gyurcsány show”, Orbán insisted that the borders would be opened by them and “our grandchildren will cry … that’s if there are any left.”
The prime minister said Brussels and Hungary had different views concerning Europe’s valuable traditions, the future of nations, and the family.
Noting the referendum on child protection to be held at the same time as the general election, he said: “The father is a man, the mother is a woman, and our children won’t be left unprotected.”
Orbán spoke of “deep differences between Brussels and Hungary”, saying this was explained by the fact that Western countries had not lived through a dictatorship. “We did not just have freedom; we fought for it.”
“The Cold War was won by the Poles, the Czechs, the Hungarians, the Germans, the Bulgarians, the Romanians, the Estonians, the Latvians and the Lithuanians,” he said, adding that anti-communism and the national idea “won the Cold War by restoring the nation state”.
“But they believe their liberal democracy overcame communism … George Soros is their hero,” he said.
Orbán said Hungary’s constitutional system guaranteed the rule of law, while “for them the rule of law is a tool to mould us in their own image”. “They’re not interested facts or arguments; they’re fighting a holy war, a jihad of the rule of law.”
Accusing the left-wing administration of Budapest of creating “chaos, dirt, homelessness and traffic jams, corruption, … arrogance and laziness”, Orbán said “everyone can see, they’re going backwards, not forwards”.
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