Prime Minister Viktor Orbán's Speech at the Inauguration of the new Administrative Data Processing Centre (KAFIR) in Vásárosnamény

Good Morning, Ladies and Gentlemen,

I have learned from Hungary's police officers that when someone is praised for doing something, the suitable reply is to say: I serve my country! Attila, Mr. Mayor, this is what I would like to say in reply to the many words of thanks that I have received from local residents. And indeed, Ladies and Gentlemen, it is always a good feeling when someone decides to do something, goes to work and then completes the task successfully. And if that thing is also useful, then it is doubly satisfying. And what we have realised here together is doubly satisfying, because we have achieved something useful, and I will say a few words about that in a moment. Thanks also to the people of Szombathely by the way, for having shown us an excellent example and establishing the first such institution in Hungary, and which according to all assessments operates outstandingly, in addition to which, as we have already heard from Mayor Attila Tilki, we have also succeeded in creating jobs. Jobs that provide work for people who would not have a workplace if this project had not been realised.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

As has already been mentioned a little earlier, it was at the cabinet meeting we held here in Vásárosnamény that we decided on realising this investment project at a cost of 1.8 billion forints. These funds come from the central budget, meaning that Hungarian taxpayers have racked up this money together so that we may realise this investment project. The Chief of Police [General Károly Papp] also mentioned that Hungary has received an international award, and it would be worth saying a few words about that, too. The image we have of ourselves when it comes to road safety is that we are relatively undisciplined. I'm not sure whether the news is all good, with reference to the fact that we will have to pay the fine if we commit an offence abroad, as we have just heard, but from the perspective of the Chief of Police, if foreigners commit road traffic offences here, which they haven't had to pay fines for until now, but which they will now have to pay, then on balance Hungarian finances may have the upper hand, it may be advantageous for the budget. But getting back to the issue at hand, although we do not necessarily have a very high opinion of ourselves with regard to road safety and discipline, nevertheless, as we have heard, things have improved significantly, and to quote a well-known and popular slogan: Hungary is performing better, also within the field of road safety. We know this because, and this is important news, 740 people died in road traffic accidents in 2010, but according to aggregate data, 588 people lost their lives in 2013. This is still much too many, the population of a small village practically, but it is at least less than three years ago. And so the tendency is encouraging, but we are still not as courageous as the Swedes, because the Swedish have announced no less an objective than for nobody to die on the roads in Sweden. We would also like to achieve this level, of course, but as you can see from the figures, we still have a long way to go.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

We thought long and hard before deciding on this investment project, because it would also have been logical to expand the centre at Szombathely, because Szombathely would have been capable of performing this administrative task at a national level. The Szombathely centre has done an excellent job so far, and so expanding its sphere of competence would have been justified from this perspective also. But when deciding on an issue such as this, one cannot take into consideration only one criteria, the criteria of efficiency, because the country has other criteria, other perspectives, other interests and other approaches, and so we decided – hats off to the people of Szombathely, but – it would perhaps be fairer to on this occasion divide the country in two, into an eastern and western region, and to realise the project to serve the people of the eastern part of the country not in Szombathely, but here in Vásárosnamény instead. It is perhaps fairer this way and hopefully it will be as efficient with regard to the way it operates as the centre in Szombathely. There will be some nice competition. I would by all accounts like to say a special thank you to Sándor Czomba [The Ministry of National Economy's Minister of State for Employment Policy]. When we arrived at the question of well, Sándor, where should this project be realised then, he said: well here, in 'Namény! And that was the end of the scientific groundwork, Ladies and Gentlemen, and so I would like to thank Sándor for that. But in all seriousness, we put this question to Sándor: "So tell us Sándor, dear Minister of State, will there be people here who work?" And he said yes, there will be people here who work. And in fact he said, since he is also responsible for the economic rationality of the public work programme, and as I am sure you know, luckily, the Ministry of Interior supervises public works, but to ensure that this occurs in a financially sound manner also requires a lot of work on the part of the Ministry of National Economy's Minister of State for Employment, as a result of which our Member of Parliament from Vásárosnamény is also involved in issues relating to public work, and so he said that this will be an excellent example of how people can move on from the world of public work to where they can perform proper, full-time work with a full salary, and with the hope provided by an income that provides a much greater perspective than public work.

There is always much debate about the issue of public work and there are many ways of looking at it, but everyone undoubtedly agrees that one of the important indicators of our public work related value judgements is the question of at what rate and to what extent those people who choose to work rather than living off benefits are able to move on from public work either within the labour market or in the direction of full time work as public servants. And I think that if we performed some quick statistics, then we would see that many people, and especially women, do indeed successfully move on from doing public work. On the other hand, when talking about public work we must always stand up against and reject those opinions that try to degrade public work, and as such also degrade the people who perform public work. This may not be their intent from a human perspective, but those who look down on public work, and who as such look down on work itself, also look down on those people who perform that work. And accordingly we must stand up to protect the dignity of public workers and should instead thank them for having become partners, for having joined us and accepted our offer to try and make a living from working in future rather than from benefits. And I think this is a great achievement, especially in the case of families in which nobody has worked for the past ten, fifteen, twenty years. And so public work is a gateway through which people can step from the world of benefits into the world of work, and this is something we should appreciate. I am proud of the fact that more and more people are taking advantage of this opportunity here in this County, and we also undertake – providing we receive the support of the electorate – to ensure that every single person in Hungary who lives off benefits has the opportunity, if they so desire, to decide to make a living from work instead, because either the economy or the state or the public work system will provide such an opportunity.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Getting back to the subject of this project, the plans were ready in January, the project received its building permit in May, the foundation stone was laid in June, and by 20 December the whole building was ready. And we must say thank you to Hungarian Constructing Co. and to Mr. Tibor Tolnay for their especially precise, exemplary and rapid work.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I must also say a few words about the fact that a project of this kind of course also required the good will and willingness to cooperate of local residents. This is a joint success. Naturally, we motivated the town, which primarily means that we freed it from 590 million forints of debt. Let us stop for a moment to point out that the debt, which the local government was forced to take on and accumulated over the past years, weighed heavily on Vásárosnamény, and the Government took the weight of these 590 million forints in debt off the shoulders of the people who live here. As a consequence of this, the town then gave us a plot of land free of charge, on which we were able to realise this project after which, as I have mentioned, the town and the surrounding settlements, whose mayors I would also like to thank, provided suitable labour. According to the report I have here, we advertised 291 jobs, for which 947 people submitted applications. This tells us a lot about the state of affairs in this region and it draws our attention to the fact that there is still much to do if we wish to achieve a level at which everyone who wants to work has a job. Of course, filling out a job application and being suited to performing the job are two different things, and this is another subject of debate with regard to the public work programme. 472 out of the 947 job applicants fulfilled the requirements, which is a good ratio and shows that the region doesn't only have a supply of unskilled labour, but also of skilled workers. According to the report I received, 235 of the people who were hired hade until then been officially registered as being unemployed. This project reduced the number of unemployed people by this many, once again proving that people want to work, many people also have the required training and do want to fill vacant positions and make a living from working rather than from benefits.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

And now, there is something else I would like to say. This is not the first time that we have met here in 'Namény, and the cabinet meeting a few months ago was not the first time either. The relationship between this region and our political community goes back many years. I would like to remind you of the fact that we already rebuilt part of the County, when entire villages had to be reconstructed following the flood. We have proven – and I would like to draw the attention of the region's mayors to this fact – that we are operating a national administration that leaves no one by the wayside and on which you can always depend, especially in times of trouble. And it may be true that the seat of Government is in Budapest, in accordance with historical tradition, but we have a government that is not prepared to forsake any of the country's regions or a any individual living in the furthest corner of the land, and who is searching for ways to provide them with help and support.

It is also important, since we are approaching an election campaign, or rather are by now already in the middle of one, that I say thank you for the support that people living here have always provided to our political community, to the Government, and sometimes also to me personally, because people living in this region have always had confidence in us, have always honoured us with their trust, and we have always received a mandate from them. I would like to ask that you tell people, and especially that the mayors here tell the people who have stayed at home within the Bereg area, that they can count on our support, and just as they have been able to count on us during these past decades, they will also be able to count on us in future.

I would like to congratulate everyone. I would like to congratulate the Mayor. Thank you for your involvement, Sándor. Thank you for your help, Mayor Tilki. Congratulations to the Chief of Police for ensuring that the Ministry of Interior supported this cause. Congratulations to the Lieutenant General and Chief of Police for your supervision, and thank you once again to the building contractors, because we have spoken unduly little of Hungarian contractors here today, despite the fact that without them, we would be incapable of realising even the most excellent political decisions. And so I would also like to thank the contractors, Hungarian Constructing Co., for having clearly performed their work in good quality and in an accurate and precise manner according to plan. This is how we would like to see Hungary in the upcoming years, as is it built, grows and provides more and more people with work in every corner of the country.

Thank you for your kind attention.

(Prime Minister’s Office)