Press Conferences

18. 9. 200611:59

Press conference of Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek held on Wednesday, 13 September 2006, after the meeting of the Government of the CR

Press conference of Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek held on Wednesday, 13 September 2006, after the meeting of the Government of the CR:
Radim Ochvat, Secretary of the Prime Minister: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, welcome at the press conference, which immediately follows the Government’s session. I welcome the Prime Minister, Mr. Mirek Topolánek, Deputy Prime Minister Petr Nečas, Minister of Finance Vlastimil Tlustý and Minister of the Interior Ivan Langer. Mr. Prime Minister, you have the floor.

Mirek Topolánek, Prime Minister of the Government of the CR: Thank you. As you are aware, we appear here at the press conference much later than we originally thought, and I would like to apologise for that; the Government’s meeting today proved to take more time than we anticipated and had many more agenda items than we thought after such a short time. Well, the opposite was true this time. At today’s meeting of the Government, we considered a number of materials, draft laws from the Senate as well as from the Chamber of Deputies, but also a number of other materials, about which you will be informed by my colleagues. As far as my competencies are concerned, the information which deserves certain attention, concerns the intelligence services. The Government entrusted BIS (the Czech Security Information Service) with the coordination of the special fight against terrorism, and asked the Minister of the Interior and the Minister of Defence to ensure that the services within their competencies operatively share analytical information from the fight against terrorism with the BIS centre. Director Lang thus became a sort of the supreme commander in the fight against terrorism. Additional measures in the spirit of this Government’s decision will follow. My second announcement is rather of informative nature – Mr. Hostek, Director of the National Security Office, tendered his resignation. His deputy Dr. Jůzová has been entrusted with the Office’s management, and I was asked by the Government to discuss with the relevant parliamentary committee the appointment of the new director. I think that these are the pieces of information you could be interested in, and I now pass the floor to my colleagues.

Radim Ochvat, Secretary of the Prime Minister: Thank you and I ask Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Labour and Social Affairs Petr Nečas to take the floor.
Petr Nečas, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Labour and Social Affairs: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Today’s meeting of the Government discussed also a highly important issue of the pension system and the trends displayed by the pension system in the course of the present year. The fact is that originally allocated in the draft state budget for pensions was the amount of some CZK 257 billion. By the end of August, that is after two-thirds of the year, it appears that expended was more than 69 % of the allocated amount. The first six months of the present year saw an increase in the number of retirees by 32 000, which is by 12 000 more than in the course of the entire preceding year. In other words, the pension system costs tend to rapidly increase. The existing budget allocations, as approved by the former government for this year, will only suffice for the payment of pensions roughly up to mid-December of this year. This means that the Government has to adopt extraordinary measures to ensure the payment of pensions in accordance with law so that pensions of our fellow citizens in the retirement age be not jeopardised. The Government guarantees that it would not happen. A decision was made today that the pension system will be reinforced this year by an amount of more than CZK 10 billion with a view to guarantee that this year, including advance payments for January 2007, there will be enough resources in the system, and pensions will be paid as they should. The new development in the pension system, that is the shortage of financial resources towards the end of this year, once again points to the urgency and necessity of the adjustment of our pension system. It is clear that we should immediately undertake certain reform measures that will lead, as a first step, to parametric changes in the transient pension system, and later to additional steps that will stabilise our pension system. It is clear that a notion that our pension system shows sufficient surpluses and that we may wait for additional 10 or 15 years is false, is suicidal, and the responsible political representation and this Government will act on this issue as well, which means that we will intensively prepare fundamental steps aimed at the pension reform.

Radim Ochvat, Secretary of the Prime Minister: I thank the Deputy Prime Minister and I now pass the floor to Minister of Finance Vlastimil Tlustý.
Vlastimil Tlustý, Minister of Finance: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I was asked at today’s meeting of the Government to prepare, for an extraordinary meeting of the Government to be held on 25 September, a final version by the Ministry of Finance of the draft law on the state budget, on the understanding that the Government will at this extraordinary meeting on 25 September approve the final version of the draft law on the state budget to be submitted to the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic.
Radim Ochvat, Secretary of the Prime Minister: I thank the Minister, and I now Ivan Langer, Minister of the Interior, has the floor.
Ivan Langer, Minister of the Interior: Good morning. The Government discussed today my proposal, which is the so-called Project 1000, on the modernisation and new outfit of 1000 police stations all over the Czech Republic. I am very glad that the Government gave its consent to and supported the concept, because it strives to improve the existing unsatisfactory environment of police stations; it is the police stations with which victims of criminal activities come into immediate contact, and many times find themselves in much more undignified conditions than persons, who are suspected of committing the criminal activities concerned. The project thus aims at creating at the police stations such environment that would be conducive to an atmosphere of confidence and safety for the victims of criminal activities and, at the same time, all this will increase the policemen’s motivation for their work, because they will have good professional conditions for their work. The Government agreed to change its decision, which means that the Ministry of the Interior will raise an amount of CZK 613 million by sale of property in the ownership of the Ministry of the Interior, and this money will be used for the project’s implementation. We had a very extensive and, I should add, complicated discussion on the definition of the detailed mechanism of how to handle the property in the ownership of the Ministry of the Interior and I shall seek to finalise its shape together with the Minister of Finance. I consider the project to represent a highly important step and a clear signal for both the public and the uniformed bodies, and I would like to thank the Government for lending its support to this project.

Radim Ochvat, Secretary of the Prime Minister: I thank you, and now the last few words of the opening of the press conference by the Prime Minister.
Mirek Topolánek, Prime Minister of the CR: We have tried to introduce the main issues, but there were of course many other items on our agenda. The Minister of Labour and Social Affairs and Deputy Prime Minister Nečas and of course also the Minister of Finance Vlastimil correctly described the sad situation they face in their budget chapters in view of their responsibility for the state budget. But, in addition to that, I wish to make a certain political statement or a politically plain phrase for you to understand – what Petr Nečas said actually means that the deficit of this year’s budget will increase by CZK 10 billion, because the former government failed to ensure sufficient resources for the payment of pensions to our fellow citizens. And what Vlastimil Tlustý had to say actually means that the proclaimed 88 billion of the state budget deficit for the next year was nothing more than wishful thinking or rather a trick, but we want to deal with real figures. I speak of this because we should strictly separate the responsibility for the pension account in the present year and the budget prepared for the next year as from the functioning of this government. Thank you.

Radim Ochvat, Secretary of the Prime Minister: Thank you. And now, ladies and gentlemen, your questions. I should only remind you that an extraordinary press conference on the accusations made by Deputy Paroubek will take place at 13.30. The floor is open.

Kamil Houska, Television Nova: Good morning, I would like to ask whether you could comment on the outcome of the discussion on cash registers or on the law on cash registers. And also if you discussed the point system, if you, for example, supported the draft by the deputies. Thank you.
Mirek Topolánek, Prime Minister of the Government of the CR: On the first question, which concerned the proposal prepared by several deputies - Paroubek, Bursík, Kalousek, Topolánek and I think several other deputies- which is a proposal to postpone the effect of the law on obligatory use of cash registers, I can tell you that the Government unanimously recommended it and the proposal is being sent back to the Chamber of Deputies without reservations. On the other issue, I must say that there are a number of comments. The Government’s decision and accompanying recommendations contain a number of (a) reservations and (b) amendments. And it is now for the Chamber of Deputies to elaborate and complete, using the standard parliamentary mechanism, the amended law submitted by Eva Dundáčková and Vlastimil Tlustý as the parliamentary initiative. The Government, however, recommends it to the Chamber of Deputies, and sends it back together with the reservations and amendment contained in the accompanying note to its decision.

Kamil Houska, Television Nova: Can you give us an example as to the kind of reservations?
Vlastimil Tlustý, Minister of Finance: Ladies and gentlemen, as the floor manager with respect to this draft law, I would like to inform you that the Minister of Transport, our colleague Mr. Řebíček, was asked to gather all additional comments that were voiced in the meantime, both in writing by individual government ministers and by the public, but also by the staff of the Ministry of Transport. And I assume that in the course of the discussion in the Chamber of Deputies, a parliamentary proposal based on these comments will be submitted which would amend or revise the original initiative by the deputies.
Ivan Langer, Minister of the Interior: I would like to mention a specific example from the Ministry of the Interior. I asked to include in the amendment, which was mentioned by the Minister of Finance, for example an amendment to the Road Network Act, which on the one hand relieves the police and fire department vehicles from the toll payment obligations but, at the same time, imposes upon them an obligation to have this marking apparatus on their vehicles, which is absurd and would represent wasted expenditures of tens of millions crowns.

Radim Ochvat, Secretary of the Prime Minister: Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, I invite the last question. Mr. Drahoňovský, please.
Redactor Drahoňovský, Television Prima: Good morning. I wanted to ask whether the Government’s statement of policy was on the agenda of today’s meeting of the Government. And, if the answer is yes, could you comment on its contents? Thank you.
Mirek Topolánek, Prime Minister of the Government of the CR: Petr Nečas will answer your question.
Petr Nečas, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Labour and Social Affairs: Intensive works are underway on the statement of policy, first drafts have been prepared in the sort of a zero variant .....inarticulate… We assume that the next Government meeting will consider the text, which will be after further adjustments well in advance discussed with the political partners in the Chamber of Deputies so that the Government could aspire for a vote of confidence. In other words, at this moment the draft is discussed at bilateral levels with individual ministers. A decision has been taken on the extent of the Government’s statement of policy, on its structure, basic directions and priorities.
Mirek Topolánek, Prime Minister of the Government of the CR: Thank you, have a nice day.

Radim Ochvat, Secretary of the Prime Minister: Thank you. Just a reminder that we shall see each other probably at 13.30 on the 1st floor.