“Lex Tusk” or EU money? Serious Warning. The Polish economy may suffer

We expect the appointment of a commission [ds. badania wpływów rosyjskich – red.] aggravate Poland’s already strained relationship with the EU over rule of law concerns and jeopardize access to a significant amount of EU funding

– comments the rating agency Moody’s quoted by Adds that in its opinion, the chances for the Polish government to reach an agreement with the EU on the payment of funds from the EU Reconstruction Fund before the autumn parliamentary elections are small.

Without the funds from the Recovery and Resilience Funds, Poland’s real GDP growth would be lower by 0.4-1.0 pp on average. by 2027

Moody’s estimates. He notes, however, that some KPO projects are initiated and pre-financed by the government through the Polish Development Fund.

This is true – PFR itself confirmed this on Thursday, stating that for the time being it will pre-finance the project from the National Reconstruction Plan from refunds from the pandemic financial shields for business, but if these run out (and there will still be no EU funds), the Fund will raise capital issuing treasury bonds. In other words, development projects under KPO will be financed by Poland not with non-repayable EU subsidies and cheap loans, but by issuing its own debt. Today, it is relatively expensive – especially that PFR bonds have a higher yield than Treasury securities. In addition, Poland, e.g. in connection with armaments, has plans for further debts of several hundred billion for the coming years.

Brussels reacts to “Lex Tusk”

Already on Tuesday, the day after President Duda signed the so-called Lex Tusk, that he is “particularly concerned about the Polish law on the commission, which may deprive a citizen of rights without the possibility of appeal to the court.” He added that the European Commission would not hesitate to take appropriate measures and that “it is impossible to agree to such a system”.

the act on the establishment of a state commission for examining Russian influence on the internal security of the Republic of Poland in 2007-2022 stipulates that the commission has basically unlimited access to all information and documents.

If he decides that someone acted under Russian influence – which is defined very broadly – he can issue administrative decisions prohibiting him from performing public functions related to spending public money for up to 10 years, which in practice means the inability to perform a government function, and yes deprived of access to secret information for a long time

Gadek wrote. It notes that these decisions can be appealed to the administrative court. However, this will not automatically suspend the validity of the decision.