A PROGRAM FOR ORDINARY POLES
CZESŁAW RYSZKA
The events in Ukraine have obscured the significance of the Second Meeting of the IV Congress of Law and Justice which was held in Warsaw on 15 February 2014. It had a programmatic character and its issues were: health, work, family. These are three key problems of Poles to solve or: three biggest dangers today with which the government of the Civic Platform and the Polish People’s Alliance cannot cope. After 6 years of the government of the prime minister Donald Tusk, we have ruined public finances and a very dangerous demographic situation. The governors explain the situation with a crisis and also state that the crisis was overcome. They show increasing economic indicators, cut through ribbons on roads, boast about money from the EU, and, at the same time, thousands of Polish enterprises and family companies get into bankruptcy, over 2 million of hungry children attend schools, thousands of families live beyond the limit of poverty. It is only a matter of time when also in our country people will come out into streets! What is the program of the authority like in order to change it? It can be expressed in this slogan: ‘Everything for people, but only for one’s own people’.
Therefore, it is worth recalling the program of changes, proposed during the mentioned congress. In the issue of the health care system, the Law and Justice party wants to return to budget financing: the National Health Service would be liquidated and health fees would get to the state budget. Voivodes would be responsible for financing considerations on the level of provinces and they would negotiate contracts of considerations and control their executions. There would appear a network of hospitals arranged relatively to the needs of population. None hospital would be closed down. Shortening queues to doctors specialists would be favoured by increasing the role of GPs, who should do many services belonging to competences of doctors specialists (it is ridiculous to refer a patient to a specialist clinic only for a diagnosis, as a result, a patient is first waiting a few months in a queue to a neurologist, later a quarter for resonance, next comes with a result and waits 3 quarters for an operation).
Within the program ‘work’ 1.2 million workplace would be created, especially for young people. The program stipulates: decrease of fees for social insurances by a half in these regions, where there is a danger of unemployment, tax relieves in connection with creating new workplaces or preferable credits for unemployed graduates who will want to start their business. There is also going to be a referendum concerning retirement system – whether it is going to be capital or of solidarity contribution, women will be given a right for retirement at the age of 60 – with 20 years of employment, and men at the age of 65 – with 25 years of employment. The Law and Justice party also wants the return to 8 years of primary education and 4 years of secondary education.
In the case of family – here the main dangers result from the demographic catastrophe. Therefore, the key element of the program is pro-family policy. The Law and Justice party postulates family tax every month in the amount of 500 zlotys for every second and next child in a family, paid out till a child reaches the age of 18 (the benefit would not be given to families with high income). Maternity leave and childcare leave are going to be prolonged, as well as generally available and free preschool care. The program also includes a provision about an attempt to implement the zero rate of the VAT tax on children’s products (if the EU does not agree to it, the system of VAT tax return for parents will be introduced).The program assumes that Poland should spend on pro-family policy about 4 percent of the GDP.
Where to take money from? It is to come from various sources: from EU funds, from taxation of banks and hypermarkets, from state companies, from increasing accessibility to credits, from encouraging private enterprise to invest into economy the means which are being maintained in bank deposits (instead there are going to be tax relieves from reinvested profits). The program announced introduction of the third rate in the PIT tax - 39 per cent from the income over 300 thousand zlotys annually. A tax payer investing and creating new workplaces could count off an amount of investment expenditures from the taxation base. A VAT tax payer will be able to account for tax with the tax revenue office on the basis of cash (a duty of paying tax not at the moment of issuing an invoice, but at the moment of receiving a payment).
These are only a few matters taken from the program of the Law and Justice party about which Jarosław Kaczyński says, that it was not created to cut through ribbons, or for indicators, or for the glory of the authority. ‘This is a program for Poles, Polish families. This is a program which is to lead to employment, higher salaries, increased number of flats, good health service, decent pensions…’.
The prime minister Tusk proposed Jarosław Kaczyński a debate on this issue. The chairman of the Law and Justice party does not say no, but to prevent the meeting from changing into a ‘Sejm’ quarrel, he would like to get to know the program of the Civic Platform. The problem is that it has been 6 years of the government of the prime minister Tusk and nobody has ever seen the program of the Civic Platform party.
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"Niedziela" 9/2014