Hungary sends reply to the EU Commission on rule of law issues

The Hungarian Government has sent a letter of reply to the European Commission on the budget conditionality procedure, Minister of Justice Judit Varga announced in a Facebook post at midnight on Monday.

At the end of July, the Commission gave one more month to Hungary to respond to their concerns about the state of the rule of law in the country.

Varga wrote that "the response was preceded by intensive consultation. In one month, we held 10 video conferences and numerous meetings with the Commission, with more than 100 draft measures circulated and consulted on. The Hungarian Government has put a comprehensive package of measures on the table to address all the Commission's concerns. The Hungarian Government remains open to a constructive dialogue with the Commission".

The midnight deadline on Monday was part of an EU rule of law procedure, known as the "conditionality mechanism", which aims to protect the EU's financial interests against violations of the rule of law by the government of an EU member state. This procedure is separate and distinct from any other legal or political procedure – such as the one initiated by the European Parliament – brought by an EU body against the Hungarian government.

The European Commission believes that EU funds are at risk in Hungary mainly because of corruption, which has been allowed to weave its way through the tendering system for EU-funded projects involving only one bidder, usually linked to the governing party.

The EU executive also has concerns about the independence of the judiciary, the media, and NGOs. The government has been informed of these concerns for several years, but after the entry into force of the rule of law regulation, and its review and approval by the European Court of Justice, initiated by the Hungarian government, the European Commission finally launched the rule of law procedure against Hungary at the end of April.

The Hungarian government sent its response to EU concerns about public procurement, the independence of investigating and prosecuting authorities, the fight against corruption and agricultural subsidies at the end of June. So far, the Fidesz cabinet has mainly come up with the proposals it presented in the negotiations on the recovery plan. Gergely Gulyás, Minister at the Prime Minister's Office announced in early July that the government would yield to the Commission's requests on several points:

• It commits to reducing the proportion of single-bidder public procurements to below 15 percent in Hungary.
• In corruption cases, anyone can go to court to seek redress if the prosecution stops proceedings.
• Time should be allowed for public consultation before the government initiates legislation. The government will work to reduce the need for special, fast-track legislation.
• Part of EU funds should be used by the government to achieve as much energy independence as possible.

The government is now making gestures to stamp out corruption because some HUF 11 billion of EU money is still frozen for the next few years.

Update: reacting to Judit Varga's post, Socialist MEP István Ujhelyi published a statement saying that "It is clear that the Fidesz government is now striking a much more subtle tone: no more irritated citing of the name of George Soros, blackmail or completely nonsense propaganda about preventing kindergarten children from having gender reassignment surgery, but a seemingly cooperative Hungarian side", he added: "If the Hungarian cabinet has indeed sent a comprehensive package of measures to Brussels and it addresses all concerns, then there is no reason why the full letter should not be made public! At the very least, the government should be expected to negotiate with the EU leadership with its cards on the table, not behind the backs of the Hungarian people and at their expense. So make the full correspondence public, this is a fundamental and legitimate claim against the government."