Prime Minister: we will open Baltic Pipe this autumn, on schedule, on budget

We have planned the Baltic Pipe gas pipeline to open in autumn this year, and we will open this pipeline in autumn as planned, as budgeted, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki told Radio Koszalin on Monday. Norwegian gas will flow to Poland later this year, he assured.

– A true community – and Poland must be a true community – must be about helping, about supporting those who are in want, in misery, and the post-state farm areas were exactly that, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki told Polskie Radio Koszalin on Monday, referring to the awarding of investment grants for the post-state farm areas under the government’s Strategic Investment Programme.

He stressed that road investments are very important, which are also an opportunity “to attract entrepreneurs” and an opportunity to create new jobs.

– These are beautiful lands, they can be attractive for tourism, for business, for entrepreneurs, only it is necessary to be able to get here, there must be civilised conditions, hence the investments (among others) in water supply (…) All this is something we will certainly continue,” said the head of government.

Asked if the measures being taken for people who may have heating problems in the winter are likely to be completed before the heating season, he said: “I think so”.

– Many of the mayors and aldermen I spoke to already have investments planned, moreover the call for their applications was spread over several months, so they had already factored the inflation factor into their calculations. And besides, their subsidy for the implementation of this project is minimal,” Morawiecki pointed out, recalling that the support is financed from the state budget.

He stressed that the investments will also be a development boost for local businesses, as “projects spread over several municipalities and districts will not be implemented by large multinational corporations”.

– And our idea is for the local entrepreneur to get rich in the local market,” the Prime Minister said.

Asked if there was any concern that the economic and geopolitical situation would bring road projects to a halt, especially in Central Pomerania, he stressed that despite the war and “Putin’s inflation”, we have a “record number of foreign investments”, and this means that other countries “have confidence in our economic model”.

– The stability of our public finances for this year and for the years to come is very solid, and all this shows that we will also have planned funds for those major arteries that are so important for Western Pomerania, Morawiecki stressed, mentioning the S11 and S6 roads.

Morawiecki was asked whether there was certainty that enough gas would flow through the Baltic Pipe pipeline for Poland.

– Putin is blackmailing the whole of Europe today: Germany, the Netherlands, Austria, he is brutally limiting gas supplies (…) We do not have such dependence on Russia – for the first time since we started buying gas. That is because the Law and Justice government six years ago started building the Baltic gas pipeline. And we have scheduled this gas pipeline for opening in the autumn of this year. And in the autumn of this year we will open this gas pipeline, according to the plan, according to the budget,” the Prime Minister assured.

He added that “later this year Norwegian gas will flow, which will make us independent from Russia”. He indicated that there will be even more gas next year.

– At that time, PGNiG is contracting the purchase of Norwegian gas, he said.

Asked if he was satisfied with the proposal for a new sanctions package for Russia, he pointed out that “Poland is always in favour of the most far-reaching sanctions in this matter”.

– The seventh sanctions package is, one might say, a less important package, but better a fish than nothing. It is better that Western countries see the need to work on sanctions all the time than if they sit back and do nothing,” Morawiecki said.

He said he was not entirely satisfied with the proposal, “but on the other hand I am a realist and I know that working out a package of sanctions is working on the lowest common denominator, because all it takes is for one country to disagree and there is no package at all”.

Source: PortalMorski.pl