Hungarian government calls for answers on EU spending

Since amending the European Union budget requires unanimity, there is no realistic chance of approving the planned amendment, the head of the Prime Minister’s Office told a regular press briefing on Thursday.

The European Commission has asked member states to contribute another EUR 98.5 billion, or fifteen times the sum of all Hungarian annual personal income tax payments, roughly the sum of the entire Hungarian state budget, Gergely Gulyás said. Obviously, significantly less is expected of Hungary, but this is still an enormous amount, large enough that even Austria or Germany do not want to shoulder it in this form, he said.

Several issues still need to be clarified, Gulyás said, such as what the EC has spent the money on, since there should be more money, not less, as Poland and Hungary have yet to receive “a single cent”. Also, the member states that have already received some of the recovery funds complain that the payments are slow, he added.

Based on the EC’s request, EUR 50 billion would go to Ukraine, and they also want to finance interest expenditures and spend some of the money on migrants, but not on border protection, Gulyás said. In fact, one and a half billion euros would go towards raising the salaries of the “Brussels bureaucracy”, he added. Hungary cannot agree to this, and since the amendment requires unanimity, such an amendment has no realistic chance of passing, Gulyás said.

Gulyás rules out family benefit cuts, scrapping utility price caps