The Polish President, Lech Kaczyński, has invited the social partners for meetings at the Presidential Palace twice so far during 2009. The meetings aimed to investigate how to halt rising unemployment in light of the global economic crisis. The Prime Minister, Donald Tusk, also participated in the meeting. However, tensions between the heads of state and also between the government and social partners make it difficult to agree a common strategy.
Background
At the beginning of 2009, President Lech Kaczyński called two social summit meetings to discuss solutions in relation to the current economic stagnation and the demand expressed by 95% of Polish people, according to public opinion polls, to protect their jobs. The summit meetings sought to bring together representatives of trade unions, employers, local government and economists. The president also expressed his hope that the meetings would be joined by government representatives.
Discussions on adopting the euro
The first social summit took place on 25 February 2009 and was attended by President Kaczyński, Prime Minister Donald Tusk and social partner representatives. No definite solutions or arrangements were put forward. Nevertheless, the meeting’s results were interpreted in different ways. According to the prime minister, all participants at the summit agreed that signing the EU accession treaty equated to giving consent to joining the eurozone, as Poland’s economy and currency would thus be much safer. Prime Minister Tusk also stated that the government had no intention of abandoning the negotiations with the European Central Bank (ECB) on the terms and conditions of Poland’s membership of the pre-euro exchange rate mechanism (ERM2) and that Poland would seek to render the conditions of euro adoption more flexible.
On the other hand, President Kaczyński claimed that the participants of the summit had not arrived at any common standpoint on Poland’s joining the euro, arguing that the talks over Poland’s entering ERM2 were premature; he compared the idea of Poland’s rapid entry into ERM2 with ‘attempting to put out fire by fuelling it’. The president did, however, put forward a proposal to prepare a national strategy of euro adoption and emphasised that Poland had no other choice but to join the euro, and that the only differences between the major political parties in this respect related to the exact date for adopting the EU single currency. Thus, the question is not ‘if’ but when to adopt the euro in Poland.
Need for constructive social dialogue
On 30 March 2009, the second social summit called by President Kaczyński took place, where he expressed his hope that constructive social dialogue would help to prevent a substantial rise in unemployment rates. He also emphasised that developments in the economy since the beginning of the year were disturbing, particularly the increase in unemployment, the decline in the production of industry and the decrease in the balance of credits given. Hence, everything possible should be done to prevent the consolidation of these negative trends. The president once again underlined that, in his opinion, an earlier adoption of the euro would not have protected Poland from the harmful effects of the global economic crisis.
Commentary
It seems that the threat that raises the greatest anxiety of both the president and the social partners – that is, the growth in unemployment – is not nearly as bad as the problems experienced by the Polish labour market in the first years of the 21st century, when the unemployment rate exceeded as much as 20%. Similarly, the production slowdown is not even half as serious as it is in other EU Member States. Admittedly, the decrease in the balance of credits may constitute a problem and, overall, the above factors certainly should not be ignored.
However, two other threats should arouse much greater concerns. Firstly, continuous tensions exist between the key institutions of the country’s executive – the government and the president. Both parties enter into cooperation rather reluctantly and often engage in conflict. Secondly, there is a gradual worsening of relations between the government and the social partners in the Tripartite Commission for Social and Economic Issues (Trójstronna Komisja ds. Społeczno-Gospodarczych).
The latter situation was exacerbated in mid April 2009, after the government – contrary to the expectations of the social partners – failed to present its standpoint on the solutions envisaged in the so-called anti-crisis action package formulated by the social partners on 13 March 2009. The government had a deadline of the end of April 2009 to prepare a common position, and would need the further participation of the trade unions and employer organisations in efforts to reach a social agreement that could help to alleviate the damaging effects of the economic crisis.
Jacek Sroka, Institute of Public Affairs (ISP)