Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s Speech at the International Conference entitled “Visegrád Group – Europe’s Engine of Growth”
My sincere greetings to all of you, Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is with special respect that I greet the Prime Ministers present and especially President Barroso and Commissioner Hahn. Ten years have passed since the countries of the Visegrád Group joined the European Union. President Barroso was a witness to this period. This has been a decade of historical significance. We have enjoyed great, joint successes and we have had serious disputes. We are lucky enough to recall many excellent debates with President Barroso. The origin of these disputes may be summed up as being the fact that our homeland, Hungary, was the first country within the European Union to suffer an economic collapse. This was before Greece. The economic collapse that occurred prior to the one in Greece threatened to create a situation in which, there being no prior example, Hungary could be unable to find its way out of the economic collapse, because at the time the IMF and the European Union were only just beginning to assemble the elements, the elements of the crisis management model, which was later used by Ireland, Greece and several other countries. As we all know, Hungary did not use the crisis management model put forward by the IMF and the EU; it developed a totally different crisis management model, which led to much debate between the EU and Hungary. This is perhaps the right occasion, here before the whole Hungarian public, to thank President Barroso for these debates and for his presidential conduct during the course of those debates, because he was one of only a few leaders who, although he too had clearly also lost patience, insisted throughout that those disputes must be conducted only within the legal framework of the treaties currently in force and that politics should be excluded from them. Thank you, President Barroso, both for the debates themselves and for the sportsmanlike conditions that you created for the holding of those debates.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
This meeting is also a suitable occasion at which to thank Commissioner Hahn, and through him to thank the European Union for its contributions to Hungarian development policy. If Hungary had been faced with the task of simultaneously consolidating the Hungarian budget and achieving economic growth using only its own resources, it would have been impossible, because there was not enough funding available to achieve both simultaneously. Thanks to Commissioner Hahn, we had available the European funds that made it possible to put domestic resources towards consolidating the budget and EU resources towards modernising Hungary. It is thanks to both him personally and to the development policy of the Commission that Hungary has succeeded not only in exiting the crisis using its own crisis management model, but has in the meantime also succeeded in advancing.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I would like to mention a few points with regard to the vision that the Hungarian Government has with regard to the future of Europe. This is a topic that can always be discussed and which is always worthy of discussion, but this is now an especially important topic in view of the fact that we will be electing a new Commission President. The European Council will also be electing a new President, and following the end of all European elections the members of the Council, meaning Europe’s Prime Ministers, will have the responsibility of setting the directions for the next five years, in the interests of which the European institutions will be operating. So it is now not only interesting, but also important that it is made clear before the citizens of Europe what directions and what kind of Europe we would like to move towards through the workings of our European institutions.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
As my starting point, I would like to say that I often find myself confronted by an illusion that exists especially in the minds of Western Europe. This may perhaps not be identified in the case of politicians, but it certainly can be among a wide range of people who affect public opinion. In the West, in Western Europe, many people think that the current situation is the final stage of a crisis that will pass and which we will put behind us, and that if we do put the crisis behind us then the situation will automatically improve. The bad news is that this is not the case; we are already over the crisis. What we are experiencing now is not the crisis, but the European life of a new era, meaning this is the environment we will be living in for the next fifteen to twenty years, unless we change a few things radically. This is an important concept, because if the starting point according to which we are already over the crisis and the standard of living and security will not return to the level it was at previously is correct, then what follows is that if we continue to use the instruments we used to apply then things will not return to the way they were, because a new era requires new instruments. This is why everyone today is talking about a renewal following the European elections.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
The starting point for Hungary is that the treaties must be complied with. This is important because in Europe today, and especially as a result of the debate surrounding the Spitzenkandidat, there is a growing suspicion that practices which to all intents and purposes amend the Basic Treaty could become commonplace without the actual amendment of the Treaty that provides for the basic functioning of the European Union. We call this a stealth basic treaty, and we reject it. If we want to open the Basic Treaty because we would like to place various things on new foundations, then let’s open the Basic Treaty, convene a convent and debate the most important issues, but what we shouldn’t do is to all intents and purposes amend the Treaty through everyday practice. And accordingly our starting point with regard to the future of Europe is that the treaties must be complied with. Similarly, we think that the financial agreements must also be complied with, meaning that those opinions that have also become widespread within Europe, according to which the financial agreement, the Fiscal Compact, must also be opened, certain paragraphs should be repealed and a looser financial policy should be practiced, are in my view life-threateningly dangerous experiments. This would put endanger the results that we have recently achieved.
The next point that the Hungarians view as important is that if Europe wants to renew itself then it must respect its own past and its own roots, which to us means that we must respect Christianity and give all nations their rightful respect. Another issue we view as important with regard to the future of Europe is the issue of immigration. This is an extremely sensitive issue for a Central European country, because there are many Western European countries that attempt to portray the free movement of labour as a migration issue, when in fact what would serve our interests, the interests of Central European countries, would be to take a firm stand in favour of the free movement of labour while calling for a stop to immigration from outside Europe. We must practice a particularly forceful migration reduction policy while showing unwavering support for the free movement of labour within the EU. It is difficult to argue simultaneously in favour of both objectives, but this is what we must try to do. It is especially disconcerting to us that migration is sometimes described, and there is a term for it: “well-managed migration”, as something that could be capable of solving the continent’s demographic problems. We do not accept this concept. There are demographic problems that need to be managed and there are migration problems that must be handled separately. And if we require labour, and especially highly trained labour, then we must pose the question of why we aren’t spending our money on our available untrained workforce reserves, including the Roma community, for example, to whom we could provide modern training in the interests of supplying the European Union’s labour demands. We Hungarians also view as important that the attitude, which is offensive to many of us and which relativizes the value of both marriage and the family, should be less strident and offensive in future.
As far as economic policy is concerned, I would like to mention only two points before coming to a close. The first thing we would like is to achieve a change of focus with regard to energy policy. In my view, the focus during European debates on energy today is on the issue of regulation and the establishment of the internal market. We make everything dependent on what pro-market regulations we should apply within the field of energy. What the Hungarians recommend is that while this is of course also an important question, we should place the price of energy at the top of our list. Because no regulation represents a value in itself. What gives value to regulations is whether they make the given product available cheaply or whether they make it available expensively. And if today’s form of energy regulations leads to expensive European energy prices, then we need regulations, including state-level regulations if necessary, that make energy cheap. I would like to draw everyone’s attention to the fact that Europe’s plans include signing a free trade agreement with the United States in the near future. We must ask ourselves where will it lead us, Europeans, if we sign a free trade agreement, which we otherwise support in theory, when the price of energy in the United States is one third of the price of energy here in Europe? What kind of competition will that result in, dear Europeans? This is the question we should ask ourselves. And for this reason we think that we should concentrate on the price of energy and not on the regulation of energy trading.
And we have a similar comment with regard to employment. The prevailing school of thought in Europe today is that we must first put the economy in order and that will then will lead to the creation of jobs. Our opinion is the exact opposite: we think that we should first provide work to everybody and that is what will put the economy in order. So if we want an economic policy that argues in favour of jobs then the state must play a greater role, even if only temporarily, in creating jobs.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
These few points that I have mentioned already show clearly the kinds of issues that Europe’s leaders must get to grips with during the upcoming months. In closing, I would like to say that I am glad that the countries of the V4 and the people of Central Europe have an increasingly significant say in these debates. It is perhaps understandable if someone behaves with a certain reverence for ten years following their accession: they have only recently been accepted into the fold, they want to catch up to their more developed peers, we receive development funding from them and that justifies restrained, prudent and civilised behaviour. But now that an era has come to a close it is clear that the engine of European growth is in Central Europe; there would be no economic growth in Europe today without growth data from Central Europe; and so now that it has transpired that the Central European region has a success story to relate, then I think it is time for the countries of Central Europe to also raise their voices a little more courageously than before with regard to the most sensitive issues such as the ones I have just mentioned. Hungary at least will be representing these points of view and standpoints politely but firmly during the debates of the upcoming months.
Thank you for your kind attention, and I would like to say to the Prime Ministers present, to President Barroso and to Commissioner Hahn that it has been an honour for Hungary that you have visited us here today.