Gábor Gönczi: I welcome Prime Minister of Hungary Viktor Orbán to the “Tények” studio. Good evening. Thank you for joining us.
Good evening. Thank you for inviting me here.
Prime Minister, soon we’ll be talking about how much easier life will be for Hungarian families from this year onwards. But before we launch into that, I suggest we talk about what the whole world is talking about: yesterday’s meeting between Donald Trump and Zelenskyy, which was disastrous – or at least didn’t go as planned. What do you think about that?
What’s more, the two things are interlinked: there’s a close link between how we’ll live our lives this year and next year, and how world politics and the fate of war and peace develop. So what happened yesterday is something that we need to follow not as spectators, but as people who are involved. What we saw yesterday was bad news, because it would be good news if the Ukrainian president agreed on peace with the peace-loving American president; but that isn’t the case, and we saw the evidence of that yesterday.
They say it was bad even to watch what happened. Zelensky left hurriedly – in fact Donald Trump almost kicked him out of the White House. This wasn’t what we wanted as the first step in the peace process, was it? But might this be some kind of strange dance, with which we’re approaching it after all?
I’ve seen this before, except behind closed doors. And indeed I’ve been involved in some tough, difficult negotiations. It’s true they weren’t with the US president, but rather in Brussels. But such things happen behind closed doors, and so while they’re tough situations, there isn’t the same sense of embarrassment as when it’s all happening on a stage, in front of the cameras, with everyone sensing that something’s not right. And what’s more, the stakes aren’t small – because it’s about the future and the war, about the future of the Hungarians and Europe, and peace in Europe and Hungary. And I repeat: I see an American president who has surprised the world by doing what he promised. The whole world is surprised because he’s taking steps that no one expected, even though he said in advance that he’d do it. For example, on the issue of peace he’s said that he’ll use all means to bring peace. And now he’s doing that. But although Ukraine is exhausted, the Ukrainian president doesn’t want peace – or at least he doesn’t want peace on the terms that the Americans are offering. Many people have died, there are orphans, widows, terrible material destruction, millions of people have fled, and Ukraine is essentially on life support. If the European Union and the Americans don’t give them money, then the Ukrainians cannot fight and the Ukrainian state cannot survive. A president in this situation was negotiating with the US president, who wanted peace. This is what created the bad feeling that came over us when we saw this negotiation.
It’s strange that the European Union immediately sided with Zelenskyy. Do you think this is a bad move?
Because the Europeans want war. The Europeans want to continue the war. There are only two countries in Europe that have wanted peace since the beginning of the war: the Vatican and Hungary. We’ve just been joined by the United States, so now we’re in the majority and we’re stronger; but in the Western world the pro-war side has been in the majority all along, and now in Brussels the pro-war side is still in the majority.
Well, let’s hope for the best. And I can see that you’re still optimistic about peace.
Well, this is very important to us. We’ve lost about 20 billion euros in three years because of energy prices, because of sanctions. So this war, apart from causing a lot of human suffering and even risking a third world war, is – or will be – a serious loss of economic blood for Hungarians. So we’re suffering a huge loss of business. If we had this 20 billion euros and it was in the Hungarian economy, everything in Hungary would look better. So for us peace is not only a necessity from a Christian, human point of view, but also from our economy’s point of view. Without peace, Hungary won’t be successful in 2025 or 2026.
Let’s assume the best, there will be peace, the peace treaty will be signed in 2025, otherwise...
This is the starting point for the Hungarian government.
Right. And let’s say that this will be the year of the breakthrough: we heard you make some globally sensational announcements in your annual State of the Nation address, including the biggest tax-cutting programme in Europe. And we’ve also said that Hungary will be a tax haven for families. What does this mean?
I must stress that all of this is true if there’s peace. I believe that peace is very close, and even if there’s no peace on the front line, we can reach the point at which the risk of war spreading to Europe is reduced to almost zero. And then we’ll finally have a free hand, and we’ll be able to work and live in Hungary according to our own abilities – not in the shadow of the threat of war, but in a way guided by optimistic plans. The basic plan is to help families. After all, inflation and the three difficult years of war that we’ve just come through have hit families the hardest, families with children. Now that there’s economic growth, we’ve put together a 21-point economic programme, we can get started, and this will generate the money to double the tax credit for families with children. This is no small thing. It means that people with two children will get a tax credit of 80,000 forints, and people with three children will get somewhere around 200,000 forints. And this will certainly be done, because it’s already written into law. And we can go beyond that: this year mothers with three children will get income tax exemption for the rest of their lives; from the beginning of next year, from 1 January, mothers under 40 who have two children will get the same; and the following year, in 2027, those who are under 50, followed by those who are under 60, and then the rest. So in four years we’ll have reached the point at which mothers in Hungary who have two children will pay no personal income tax. This is truly an unprecedented world sensation. With all due modesty, let us say that no one else in the world has managed to create something like this.
We’ve calculated that in an optimum scenario there could be a mother or a woman who doesn’t pay personal income tax at any time in her life: she doesn’t pay it when she’s young, then she becomes a mother, and from then on she never pays it.
Yes, because as you say, it’s still the case that a mother under 30 with at least one child doesn’t pay income tax. So this means that the ladies and girls are already alive who will later become wives and mothers and will live their lives in Hungary without paying a single forint in personal income tax for the rest of their lives. And that’s good, because they’re taking on something that requires serious effort, that’s a burden – even if it’s a sweet burden. But it’s a serious burden, because those children have to be born, then brought up, they have to be made into decent human beings; and they’ll be a source of concern, because as long as you’re alive you’re always worried about your children. So mothers take on a serious task. And it’s not just a private matter for them, but also one for the public good; because if they don’t commit to having children, what will happen to us? So making a commitment to the family way of life and taking on the responsibility of bringing up children is the biggest commitment, the most valuable commitment they can make – both for the country and for the community.
Is there any way of calculating how much money a family with two or three children can save each year, how much extra money they’ll gain?
We have our calculations, because the budget needs to be adjusted accordingly. So it’s a very serious burden on the budget. This is the line of attack from those who oppose this family tax exemption. They say that the budget can’t cope with it, that the deficit will increase, and that we won’t be able to keep public debt under control. But we’ve calculated this, and so we have a plan on how to reduce public debt, reduce the budget deficit, and at the same time give all this to families. It will take a lot of money. Of course it will depend on who earns how much. So what it means is that for a family earning 500,000 forints a month, we calculate that 15 per cent in income tax won’t need to be paid.
Yes. They say that this is an impossible mission, and we’ve just talked about that. But you like impossible missions anyway, and in some things you’ve already proved that one shouldn’t pay attention to such arguments.
Because one thinks that if there’s something that someone else can do, then that other person should do it. You have to do things that you think only you can do – that’s the main thing, that’s where you have to swing the axe at the tree. This is something that I believe Hungary cannot do without us, without a political community that’s civic, national, Christian, and committed. I’m not saying that I personally am needed, but for this our community is definitely needed. It’s a great, worthy, real, serious goal in life when you create a tax system in which mothers who have children quite simply receive the maximum possible support – to an extent that’s unimaginable anywhere else in the world. That’s quite something, isn’t it?
Yes. And so this is now something that’s independent of peace, is it? So now it will be the same even if the war drags on.
I think that the war is now in a position where it’s been suppressed. And although terrible things are still happening on the front line, the approach of the front line to Hungary is almost impossible. So we can calmly organise our economy according to the logic of peace.
Well, this is fantastic news. This money can only stay with Hungarian families if we keep inflation under control. But recently inflation has been doing some interesting dance moves. If you look at food prices – milk up 39 per cent, eggs 35 per cent, cooking oil 11 per cent – this is a serious problem. What can be done about it?
We need to understand what’s happening. So prices aren’t simply rising: prices are being raised. We need to understand who’s raising them, why they’re raising them, and where the money’s going. So if you take a look at real life, you’ll see that, let’s say, we have our farmers who keep cows and they’re in the dairy industry. They produce the milk, they get 200 forints as the farm gate price. You go to the shop, and you pay 600. What’s happening here? So it’s quite clear that economic operators are working with margins that are unacceptable, because they’re destroying families and pensioners. We can protect families with tax credits and wage increases, but to protect pensioners we have to use special instruments. This is why we’ve chosen a method, a VAT refund method, which allows us to give pensioners a tax refund on foodstuffs that are subject to a VAT rate of more than 5 per cent. So protecting good things is at least as important as creating good things.
Yes, on the one hand there’s a rebate for pensioners, which is obviously a huge step; but on the other hand we have to work on prices, and we have to either beat them down or regulate them. What is the idea here?
Yes, so for pensioners, we want a VAT refund scheme that will allow them to get an extra amount of between ten and fifteen thousand forints a month in the simplest possible way. The other side of the coin, as you’ve said, is that of course this is only necessary when prices are rising sharply. So we must also try to reduce, prevent or control price rises. And to do this we must negotiate with the retailers, because ultimately it is always the retailers who set the final prices. They have arguments about why they can’t sell at a cheaper price, but we’d like to negotiate with them on this, and we’d respectfully ask them not to raise prices to this extent. Because if they raise prices by this much and it’s destroying families, then the Government will have to intervene. Then there should be an official price: a price cap, and a cap on their profit, on their profits from the price increase. This isn’t good, and in a normal economy one shouldn’t do that; but if the economy is out of balance because prices are being raised too much, then the Government needs to intervene – temporarily, but it needs to intervene. This is what we want to avoid. The way to avoid this is if our minister can get an agreement with the retailers – and negotiations on this are ongoing.
I like the expression that Hungary is a “tax haven for families”. Then this is a description of everything that we’ve talked about: doubling the family tax allowance, income tax exemption for child care benefit and infant care benefit, support for families with two and three children, and support for pensioners.
And there’s another element in Hungary which is already in place and in operation: anyone who’s under 25 and in work – whether they’re a lady or a gentleman, a boy or a girl – is exempt from tax, they don’t have to pay income tax if they’re under the age of 25. So it’s safe to say that, as a result of many years of work, a family life path is essentially emerging before our eyes, the result of the combination of several elements. Those who choose this way of life can certainly move forward in life in a predictable way, and see their burdens lighten as they move forward in life. After all, if I understand women and ladies and mothers, the most important thing in their lives is predictability. So I don’t know many mothers who can be happy without a secure, predictable life, without being able to rely on something or someone. That’s what we’re trying to help with now.
Or to make the right decision to go ahead, for example, on the number of children to have.
I’m being careful here, because everyone governs their own life. So it’s up to them to decide how they want to live, how they want to organise their time, how they want to balance raising children, career and work – and the Government can’t and doesn’t want to interfere in that. The Government can make an offer. So we can say to mothers who want to have children, that we can help you to... And after this there’s a long list. It’s an offer from the Government: if you accept it, you’ll take it; if you don’t, you’ll walk away.
Prime Minister, let’s move on to another important news item. It’s turned out that millions of dollars may have been given to Hungarian organisations – mostly for political influence – through the US aid system, through USAID. Many believe this could be one of the biggest political corruption scandals in the Western world. Since yesterday we have a government commissioner – András László – responsible for investigating and uncovering all this. To simplify this story, what happened here?
I’ve been in politics – and therefore in international politics – for approximately forty years, and I can say that I’ve never seen anything like it. I don’t know whether this is the biggest Western corruption scandal in history, but as an eyewitness I can say that it’s certainly the biggest in the past forty years. So I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve never seen anything like the following: billions of dollars from the US budget being transferred to foundations and various forms of support for all sorts of spurious reasons, and then being spread around the world and given to those who represent the ideals, the spirit, the programme and the specific interests that the Americans demand. They received money for this. So they’ve been bought. I’m a polite person, I don’t want to be rude, but here people have been paid for their opinions. It went as far as major celebrities – I’m talking about movie stars – being given money to go to Ukraine. So they weren’t simply enthusiastic and sympathetic towards the Ukrainians, which might also have been the case, but they were given millions of euros or millions of dollars to do what they did. The same was true for journalists. They didn’t write their own opinions, but were paid to write certain opinions. There were fake civil society organisations that weren’t simply enthusiastic in representing an important cause, but that were paid money to be enthusiastic. So this influence on the life of another country is unacceptable. Because the Hungarian people will decide what they are and aren’t enthusiastic about, what they believe and what they don’t believe, who they believe and who they don’t believe. And this mustn’t be manipulated from behind the scenes, manipulated and used to pull around public opinion in a country like a puppet on a string. This is unacceptable: a country that respects itself cannot accept such interference in its freedom and sovereignty.
What will happen to those who are found to have done this?
This kind of thing won’t happen again.
This kind of thing won’t happen again.
It won’t.
Similarly, we’ve seen the launch of a hunt for drug dealers and against the spread of drugs. Prime Minister, here at “Tények” we report something on this almost every day. What’s happening is really terrible, and it’s terrible to see that what’s almost commonplace in, say, Western Europe has now spread to us. You’ve also noticed this. How can we combat it more effectively? Because the hunt has been underway up to now also – even though we haven’t been so forthright in calling it a hunt.
A lot of problems are stacking up here. The first is that in Western Europe and in some states in America there’s been a trend to legalise the use of drugs, and therefore the trade in drugs. First of all, this must be stopped, and it must be made clear to the world that Hungary is a country where we shall never legalise the use, distribution or promotion of drugs. This must be made very clear. We’re working to ensure that even the Constitution is very clear on this. So we don’t want to become part of the Western madness that imagines drugs to be a natural part of our lives. This is the first thing. The second is that a new kind of drug scourge has appeared. This is the spread of designer drugs. We know the names of these drugs, these concoctions. Often we don’t even know what they contain, but they have a terrible effect, they’re cheap and they shatter people’s heads. And, of course, we all have children. So when you see something wrong in the world you always think first of your own children. And I can tell you that a drug dealer is a person who makes money by turning our children – someone else’s children – into wrecks, and eventually killing them. And such a person makes a living out of this, makes money from it, and benefits from it. I think this is unacceptable. In Hungary we’ve had strict rules against drug dealing, but now we’re going to ramp them up drastically, and we’ll also direct much more energy to the detection of drug dealing. Interestingly enough, we could say that this was identified among the elite, but what we’re talking about now is becoming rampant in poor rural areas, where I see that drugs are on the verge of becoming cheaper than a shot of spirits, and are therefore spreading like wildfire. So now we have to go to the smallest villages and we have to dismantle these networks there. This is why I can’t use milder language than to say that we’re going to launch a manhunt: we’ll hunt down all the drug dealers and take them out of circulation, along with their substances.
And they can expect a heavier penalty, can’t they? So it’s like...
The heaviest.
Right! Thank you for coming to visit us.
Thank you for inviting me.