Poland’s Tusk government is not so different from its PiS predecessor [Opinion]

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Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and is published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

By Krzysztof Mularczyk

OPINION

In many areas – such as social, economic, defence and migration policy – Poland’s new government differs very little from its predecessor in style and substance. And in places where it does differ, it has been unable to implement its agenda.

“It will be the same as before, only more so,” famously once said Ludwik Dorn, the former speaker of the Sejm, the lower house of Poland’s parliament.

Something similar could be said about Donald Tusk’s current ruling coalition, which, despite coming to power last year with the promise of a fresh start after eight years of rule by Law and Justice (PiS), has in many ways been a continuation of the former PiS government by other means.

Take economic and social policy. When the national-conservative PiS began introducing a generous new social welfare programme in 2015 and 2016, Tusk’s centrist Civic Platform (PO) declared such policies to be unaffordable.

But since replacing PiS in power last December, the current PO-led coalition has not only maintained those handouts but has added more of its own along with public-sector pay rises – borrowing 20 billion zloty (€4.6 billion) to fund these commitments.

Meanwhile, the election promises made by Tusk on tax have been put on the backburner. There has been no doubling of the tax-free allowance on personal income, no cuts in capital gains tax, and no reduction in employers’ social security payments.

If anything, given that the EU has now opened its excessive deficit procedure against Poland, taxes are likely to rise in the coming years.

Likewise, when in opposition, many figures in the current ruling coalition criticised the PiS government’s various “mega-projects” – such as a planned new airport and transport hub in central Poland and the rebuilding of the Saxon Palace in Warsaw – as “megalomania”.

But since coming to office, they have decided to continue them. Tusk has also supported the call from President Andrzej Duda, a PiS ally, for Poland to host a future summer Olympics.

On migration, Tusk has continued the rhetoric and policies of PiS. Shortly after coming to office, he declared that the “survival of Western civilisation” depends on preventing “uncontrolled migration”. In line with the PiS approach, he has also referred to migrants as part of “hybrid warfare” launched by Belarus and Russia against Poland and the EU.

Although many figures from the current ruling coalition once criticised PiS’s tough border policies – such as building a barrier on the Belarus border and “pushing back” migrants who crossed – they have now continued them.

Indeed, Tusk’s government has pledged to further strengthen anti-migrant border defences. It has also introduced an exclusion zone on the border similar to that implemented under PiS.

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Perhaps less surprisingly, the new government is not only continuing PiS’s rearmament drive in the face of the Russian threat, but expanding it: next year’s budget will see defence expenditure reach 4.7% of GDP, up from 4.12% this year and 3.9% in 2023.

Tusk’s administration has continued signing large arms procurement deals, mainly with the US and South Korea rather than EU partners.

The clearest difference between the current government and the PiS administration is on so-called moral-cultural issues such as abortion and LGBT rights.

Yet no progress has been made in this area, due to opposition from the Polish People’s Party (PSL), the most conservative element of ruling coalition, who joined PiS in voting down an attempt to soften the abortion law in July.

Relations with Brussels have, as expected, improved under Tusk, leading to the unblocking of billions of euros in post-pandemic recovery and structural funds that were frozen under PiS.

However, the new government has continued its PiS predecessor’s opposition to the EU migration pact, has signalled its desire to limit the bloc’s Green Deal, and remains sceptical on removing member states’ right to veto foreign and security policy. Poland is no closer to committing to entering the eurozone than it was under PiS.

Meanwhile, tensions with Poland’s two largest neighbours – Germany and Ukraine – that were apparent under PiS have continued. Warsaw has dropped PiS’s demand for war reparations from Berlin, but is instead pushing for other forms of “compensation”. It strongly criticised Germany’s decision to impose checks at all its land borders.

Tusk’s government has continued to press Kyiv to deal with the lingering legacy of the Volhynia massacres, in which Ukrainian nationalists killed around 100,000 ethnic Poles during World War Two. Like PiS, it has insisted that Ukraine allow the exhumation of victims and has suggested that Poland will not allow Ukraine to join the EU until the issue is resolved.

In its election pledges, PO promised to resolve Poland’s rule-of-law crisis. But now that it is in power, the government’s approach seems remarkably similar to that of PiS.

It has chosen to remove PiS appointees – such as the national prosecutor and the management of public media – in similar, legally questionable ways as to how PiS removed those it saw as opponents.

Instead of legislating on structural reforms, the government is concentrating on purges and is refusing to recognise courts it views as improperly constituted.

It is also willing to use mechanisms left by its predecessor, such as installing a supportive majority on the National Electoral Commission (PKW) and using it to slash state funding for PiS.

Meanwhile, after the new government’s takeover of public media, state broadcaster TVP has shifted from being a PiS mouthpiece to providing coverage now biased in favour of the new ruling coalition.

Tusk himself has effectively acknowledged the problematic nature of his government’s actions, saying that sometimes it is necessary for them to do things that are “not fully compliant with the law”.

He and his supporters argue that this is because of the legal and institutional chaos left behind by PiS, and that the ends justify the means.

But such policies, and the language used to justify them, have raised eyebrows, even among those who have thus far been supportive of the government, many of whom are uncomfortable with a government repeating many of the actions it so strongly criticised while in opposition.

PO and Tusk have been keen to emphasise how they differ from their predecessor, but this seems to be mere rhetoric. After almost one year in power, it appears that the current government – to echo Dorn’s words – is delivering more of the same.

Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Krzysztof Mularczyk worked for four years for TVP’s English language service. Previously he has held executive positions in civil society organisations and in the UN system.

Main image credit: Krystian Maj/KPRM (under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)