Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen,

I find myself in the most peculiar of situations: I usually have the honour of your presence so that you can hear my opinion on the future. I, on the other hand, usually come here to hear János Mártonyi's words of encouragement. Today was no exception. Dear János, allow me to thank you for the invitation, and for your encouraging and friendly words. If you'll allow me, I'll return the favour. On behalf of us all, I'd like to thank you for those writings - mostly produced over the past few weeks - which have made such a deep impression on us. These revealing articles concern the great questions of the world's future; on how the contest between antidemocratic capitalism and our tradition of democratic Western capitalism is to be decided; the type of questions that concern and interest us. We need these revelatory articles to lift us out of our sometimes hidebound Hungarian provincialism. This is why I am all the more glad to accept your invitation. Of course I am also honoured to greet Ferenc Mádl, former President of the Republic, and his wife Dalma; not only because this is the done thing, but also because my thanks are due to him and more than sixty of his associates. Those responsible Hungarian intellectuals have publicly raised their voices in opposition to the privatization of the healthcare system, and have convinced us that one can still find representatives of a responsible intellectual elite. Many thanks, Mr President!

Ladies and gentlemen, when I was preparing for today's gathering, I had the radio on in the background, and I had the chance to hear a list of what I was going to talk about today. I compared that list with my own, and found that they didn't match. I tried to think how I could get out of this, and what one could do in a situation like this. Finally, I decided to stick with my original concept, which I had composed in my head a few days earlier. This was essentially that when talking about 2007, I would like to focus on the good and not the bad. I would like to talk about the good that happened in the lives of Hungarians in 2007, and what it is that we can be happy about. The reason I decided this is that everyone knows about the bad things. Everybody knows what the government has been up to, and that they have deceived us. Everybody knows that people are angry, everybody knows that the country is in a desperate situation, everybody knows that the government is stuck in the past, and is captive to its own harmful, inept and unthinking policies. Everybody in Hungary sees that things are going in the wrong direction and that promises of a new politics are pointless, because by now nobody believes a word they say. If everybody sees this, there's no point in talking about it. Believe me, I could make a list of dismal idiocies and dreary lies, but it wouldn't get us anywhere; good things lead us somewhere but bad things don't. But even in bad times good things happen, and if we look for them, we'll find them. Let's try to look back on 2007 in this way. The good news is this: in 2007 the walls which divided Hungarians one from another began to crumble. We saw the collapse of the stockade which had prevented the emergence of consensus in Hungary.

My dear friends, there emerged last year the sort of consensus in Hungary for which there has been no precedent since the overthrow of Communism - if there even was one back then. As is always the case of course, the consensus is not complete, there are still some who pull back from it - either through personal commitment, deep party loyalty or simple caution. It is as if there is rubble where the walls once stood, as if the splintered remains of the stockade are jutting from the ground at strange angles. The consensus, however, in Hungary today is broad-ranging .The overwhelming majority of Hungarians want change - regardless of their party loyalty, occupation, position in society or ideology. They want to mark out a new direction for the country. The will of Hungarians is clear, consistent, determined: things cannot go on like this any longer. The time has come for the emergence in Hungary of the type of politics that can find support in Hungarian society. Believe me, this consensus is priceless, and if you think back, we have been waiting for it for a long time. We have achieved much over the past eighteen years - that is the fall of Communism, for those of you too young to remember - but no such consensus in society was ever reached, there was no such alliance between people that would have enabled us to arrive at a real breakthrough, a real and permanent breakthrough, on the most important issues. The long-awaited unity in 2007 entitled and encouraged us to set such goals for ourselves and to discuss the realization of the kinds of projects that the vast majority of people support. This gave us strength and courage, and by the end of the year we managed to put together and publish the new programme of FIDESZ - Hungarian Civic Union, entitled ‘A Stronger Hungary'. Of course I know as do you if you have read it, that it's not a magic potion (and definitely not the recipe for a perfect life), but it does outline the basic framework for the stabilization and recovery of Hungary. I might also say that it is worthy of us and worthy of a people's party. I'm sure that by now you have realized that it is people and not a political theory that can be found at the heart of politics in a people's party. It is always people that are the focus of our politics and we concern ourselves with the question of how they want to live their lives, of how they want to live their lives together and how we can help them to do this. Of course we have theories and ideas of how people can co-exist and the forms of such co-existence, but we never give in to the temptation to replace the service of people with the service of a political theory or dogma. What we practise is called the politics of a people's party.

Ladies and gentlemen, I know that today in Hungary people agree that we don't need a government and a brand of politics that people reject. I also agree. But I came here today to tell you that we need more than this. If someone says ‘I'm not going that way', at the best that person will stay where they are but won't progress any further. I admit there's some truth in the view that it's better to remain at the edge of a precipice than to fall over it. But this is not success. Think about it - if someone simply says ‘I won't do this or that', at best they won't tire themselves out, but they won't achieve success or results either. Hungary has had enough of failures caused by six years of socialist government; Hungary needs success. When a boy proposes to a girl and the answer is ‘no', then something has definitely come to an end but nothing has started. On the other hand, when two young people say ‘yes', it is the beginning of a wonderful new chapter, the opening up of a future which may be successful and happy. To put it briefly, what I want to say to you is what is written behind me ‘The future begins with "yes"'.

My dear friends, we look at competitiveness in the same way. As we all know, it is the natural environment of the modern world. Whoever doesn't say ‘yes' and doesn't take up the challenge will never reach their goal. But whoever lines up at the starting line at least has the chance to achieve something. In a sense, of course, something will happen to a person who doesn't say ‘yes' to anything, who doesn't move in any direction and who doesn't do anything at all. Although something happens, that person is not an active subject in events, but a passive object. Success cannot be reached, and it is hardly possible to lead a meaningful life. Such people drift through life, hit obstacles, conform to the will of others and in reality let other people live their lives instead of them. This is also the case with a nation. If a people does not say ‘yes', it loses its future, and its life will be put at the service of another people's life and future. Success can only come to a people which takes the initiative, decides to act, sets out on a journey - in other words a people that can say ‘yes' to something.

My dear friends, for me the concepts of success and future belong together. Nobody wants to imagine a future in which important things are not achieved. Who would hope for bad things to happen? I'm convinced that in this respect all of us in Hungary are the same: right- or left-wing, old or young, single people or those with families, liberals or conservatives. Everybody wants a successful future. In fact, in Hungary today everybody wants to say ‘yes': at most, not everybody knows exactly what to say ‘yes' to. If we look around Hungary we are just like the guests in the famous Bunuel film who are unable to leave the living room but can't understand why. We have same kind of feeling of being lost. Six years ago we were in the lead, and now we find ourselves lagging behind for no apparent reason. We are plodding along, bringing up the rear; many people feel that it's already too late to do anything about it. Let me tell you that I, however, do not accept this. I'd like to encourage people - the referendum campaign is also about this - to believe this, to try it, to say ‘yes' and if they say ‘yes' they'll find the way out. All they have to say is ‘yes', and they will feel that they have a future once again.

Ladies and gentlemen, over the past seventeen years - maybe this sounds strange coming from a party leader - I have always known that the Hungarian people are united when it comes to the most important questions. I have always thought that division is a sham and is artificial. I have had the feeling over the past seventeen years that it is only wheeled out to distract people from - how shall I put - governmental inadequacy. I remember well the times around the fall of Communism. There are many here whom we fought with side by side back then. You all know that we were standing up to our waists in the floods of political change. But we can also remember that beneath the increasingly colourful surface and ever harsher arguments there was a current of consensus. When we launched upon the transition to democracy back then we were in agreement. Then we felt that everybody knew we had a common goal. We wanted Hungary to become a better place in our lifetime or, if this was not possible, then in our children's lifetime; a Hungary where it would be good to live, to work, to be retired, to raise children and to study. We were in agreement and we were united. In essence we said that here in Carpathian Basin - and not only within the borders of Hungary but across the entire region inhabited by Hungarians - we wanted to live the life of the wealthy, Western European countries.

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. President, why were we able to agree back then? Because at that time there was a truth that we could all clearly see. So I can put it like this: then we were still able to clearly see that what united us as Hungarians amounted to far more than what divided us. If we look inwards for a moment, then perhaps we can recall those things in which we were the same, in which we were similar and on which we could agree as Hungarians.

We accept neither power without limits nor power without accountability. We all value personal freedom and our nation's independence. We all feel bad when we see mediocrity suppressing excellence, the worse suppressing the better, those with power suppressing those without. We rebel (or at least we try to) when we see the privilege of money, birth and power determining who can become what here in Hungary. Believe me, we have not lost this quality, it has not faded, and even now it unites us. Indeed, we are coming to realize more and more that increasingly stronger ties bind us together. But before I speak of this realization let me return to the question of success. You also know, ladies and gentlemen, that the modern world is full of grand-sounding propaganda about success, and - let's admit it - it's full of empty waffle as well. If we listen to the authorities today in Hungary, we find ourselves at a loss. Failure is paraded as success, and what we feel to be success is branded as failure. If more and more children are born, and if families receive more support - that is the future, that is success. Year on year fewer children are being born, the family tax credit scheme has been withdrawn: this is failure - the failure not of families, but of Hungarian politics. If more jobs are created, wages and pensions increase, if more people find work - that is the future, that is success. If salaries fall and prices rise, the value of a working wage shrinks - that is failure. If we open new schools, if thirty thousand more young people enter higher education - that is the future, that is success. If schools are closed and thirty thousand fewer enrol for university - now that is failure, that is the road to oblivion. To sell off, to close down, to abolish - this is never success, it is always failure.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is natural for people to want progress and success, not reforms. Success! Who on earth needs the kind of reform that results in everyone in Hungary being worse off? Dear friends, these political debates always become depressing and petty, because we are always being told what there is no money for. We are told where money has to be taken from if we want to give it to somebody, and at whose expense we would be able to improve the situation of another. By the end of the argument, the politicians divide the loaf into ever thinner slices, leading to declarations and excuses as to why something cannot be done. Today Hungary is travelling down this road, but this way of thinking and reasoning is a dead end. First of all, let's declare that there is money - it is just not being well allocated. If one adds up the billions that have been spent in recent years on marketing, propaganda, new cars, telephones, furniture, fake studies and Heaven knows what, then one ends up with a final figure of around 120 billion Forints.

Secondly, our programme, our goal, our future is based on a different way of thinking. We believe in growth, and not in ever thinner slices - we believe in a bigger loaf. We believe that we don't need to slice today's bread in a different way, but that the country has to bake a bigger loaf. This is the programme for growth. We believe that economic growth brings the nation success, and this also leads to success in daily life - lower taxes, rising wages, more support for families. But what do we need for growth? Why has it been in decline, why has it slowed down, why is Hungary lagging behind? Because, my dear friends, those in charge forgot that for growth three conditions are needed: health, knowledge and responsible government. Success doesn't come free - you also know this - it requires hard work. This is why for peoples around the world the most important condition for growth is that everybody can do their daily work, has the physical capacity to bear it for as many years as possible, and works at as high a standard as possible. For this one first and foremost needs health. This is why the physical resource for growth is health itself. We also know that in the modern world competition among peoples makes ever greater demands. It is not enough in itself for people to follow daily routines in their work. Ever higher performance is required, and for this qualifications and knowledge are paramount. The intellectual resource for growth is none other than knowledge.

Health and knowledge. If these two conditions are present a third is needed, capable of co-ordinating them: responsible government. Responsible government primarily means responsible leaders. The type of leaders who take people seriously, take responsibility for their actions, who are prepared to create the conditions for society being the healthiest and most highly qualified it can be, given the resources available. In a democracy people have the right to expect that the government will work for them, will be honest with them, and will tell them the truth. But what is the situation here and now? I don't know how widely known it is that among all the peoples of Europe Hungarians, Czechs and Poles are those who work the longest hours. We also know that the workers of our companies can compete with those in any firm anywhere in the world, which is why so many of them have been attracted to the West. We also know that the last seventeen years have proved enough for Hungarian business people to become acquainted with the managerial skills prevalent in the western world. To put it briefly, dear friends, all that is needed now is that Hungary should have a responsible government, one which works with the same level of dedication as found in those whom it is meant to serve. But what do we get instead of responsible government? We have a form of evasive government, but in the modern world evasion and the shirking of responsibility spell certain failure. Not even responding to challenges, not finding answers to questions: this is a recipe for certain failure. In the modern world the challenges for governments are modernization of education, maintenance of the healthcare system, and making ever newer medical treatments accessible to its people. Tax rises, the withdrawal of funds, financial cutbacks, redundancies, closures and sell-offs are in fact a form of escape from the task in hand. I think that nobody - not a single government in Europe - can shirk their responsibility while wheeling out the ridiculous argument that the state is a bad owner, or that the state is in itself corrupt, wasteful and incapable of providing resources for its people. Responsible government can never use the excuse of the state's supposed inadequacies. It cannot do this because the inadequacies and shortcomings of the state are in fact those of the government in power at any point in time. Let's be honest: it is in fact never the state that is the bad owner, but the government. When we see such problems, it is always the government that is corrupt and wasteful, and the government that is incapable of providing resources for its people.

Ladies and gentlemen, we are preparing for a referendum. If we want have a say in the debate on tuition fees then perhaps we should do something that has not yet been done: let's recall for a moment what kept hope alive, what sustained our parents' and grandparents' zest for life during the years of dictatorship. Why did they work, why did they do all they could so that their children could study? Well, because they knew that if a child studies hard then he or she can even get a university degree, can get on in life. I remember this is why they sat by us in the evening, even when they were tired. It wasn't easy, sometimes they even lost their tempers, but today we know that it was well worth it. It was worth it because we were able to finish university, we were able to advance ourselves, and we could do better in life. If we studied hard, we could get on in the world, and it is a fact, my friends, even if there were those who were deprived of these things by the regime for political reasons. And it is still true even if back then the sky was not the limit. We could get on in life, and this was true despite the fact that whenever we opened a textbook Lenin was staring out at us from under his cap.

Ladies and gentlemen, the fact of the matter is that if there had been tuition fees, I wouldn't be standing here now. If there had been tuition fees back then, very many of you would not be sitting here today. Again, let's be honest: tuition fees exclude people like us from university. Even in our day education wasn't free. I remember the lodgings, student dormitories, private lessons, language lessons, textbooks... In our time we always had to work alongside our university studies: we worked right to the end. Somehow we had to support ourselves in addition to the help we got from our parents: by night the print-works, the stables, the freight depot... If, however, there had been tuition fees, my friends, that would have been a devastating blow. Just think about it, how a married couple with university degrees or a blue-collar worker might feel when, seeing the talent in their child and sensing their burgeoning intellect, they have to say: ‘I can't pay for your studies next year'. If you don't have the money, your child cannot study. This is what tuition fees mean for the whole of Hungary.

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm bringing up five children. If any one of them couldn't study because I wasn't able to put together the necessary funds, if I wasn't able to pay the tuition fees, then I would feel it was personal failure. This is why I will never accept tuition fees closing off the opportunity for betterment for children in Hungary.

However, I'd like to address those people whose children won't go to college or university. I'd like to convince them that higher education and university are important for them too. Think about our situation: in six years we have gone from being first to being last. What is the question today? The question is how can we go from being last to being first again, and if look around at what we have then we can say that our nation - even taking into account Hungarians livings outside Hungary's borders (after all they are a part of us) - our area and population are indeed modest. Industrial raw materials and natural sources of energy - apart from agriculture - are hardly worth speaking about. The only resource that we have in abundance is that which is here, my dear friends, in our heads: our intellect. Let us say it out loud: we are a talented people. Let's not be shy about declaring the fact that when it comes to intellect we have always been at the forefront, but if we don't cultivate and refine our intellectual capacities then we won't get very far in this area. We live in a world and in an age of information and knowledge. If we train and sharpen our minds then we can be leaders in any important sphere of competition in the world; but the opposite is also true - if we neglect to do this then we will underperform in every competitive arena. So I suggest that we put aside the sometimes justified theoretical and moral arguments concerning tuition fees and not take them up again until as a nation we have become the most highly qualified intellectual powerhouse in Europe.

Ladies and gentlemen, I don't know how many of you have thought about the long term consequences of tuition fees. Bright children born into poor families will not only find that tuition fees exclude them from university, but sooner or later from academic high school also. Families will ask themselves why their children should go to academic high school if later they won't be able to fund their university education. The conclusion is clear: we won't take part in knowledge-based industries, nor in the true European future; we won't even work in tyre factories that have relocated to Hungary, but in the end we will find ourselves burning waste materials just like they do in third world countries.

However, ladies and gentlemen, here and now there is still every opportunity for Hungary to become a part of the knowledge-based world and its industries. To sum up, in connection with tuition fees I wanted to say to you that no mother or father can give their young ones a better gift than to build a country where the potential of all children can be realized, and where we give them every chance to bring out the best of their natural abilities.

Ladies and gentlemen, my dear friends, the other huge issue in the referendum is healthcare and our future. Probably everybody knows that as a country we pay some of the highest taxes and social security contributions in Europe. This is why whoever talks about free healthcare is really concealing an important fact. In Hungary today a middle income earner and his employer jointly pay around 260 to 261 thousand Forints in healthcare contributions every year. This is an annual total of more than a quarter of a million Forints. In what sense is this free? People have a right to expect in return basic healthcare provision within appropriate time limits and of an appropriate standard. We have a right to expect that doctors and nurses are decently paid. Just look at where we have got to in the fruitless battle against under-the-counter gratuities that patients pay to medical professionals: in this futile struggle we are now not only paying such gratuities, but also queue-jumping gratuities. We are now paying the latter in order to move up the waiting list, in the hope that we can perhaps be treated sooner. And what, after all, is the meaning of co-payments for visits to the doctor and daily hospital fees? It means, my dear friends, we are paying twice for the same thing. It's as if one had to pay twice when going to the theatre - once on the way in and once on the way out. Believe me, there are already many people - and the way I see economic developments, there will be even more - who can't pay twice. This means that they won't go to the doctor, they won't recover and in the end they won't be capable of working: and they will become dependent on the state. Benefits, artificially created jobs, the burden of providing aid to help them stay alive. This means that this policy, this healthcare policy costs Hungary more in the end than the state raises thorough co-payments and daily hospital fees.

Ladies and gentlemen, maybe we have to find the answer to the question of how the referendum can help us get closer to success. Why do we say that the referendum can open a route to a successful future? In other words, we have to talk about what voting ‘yes' and what voting ‘no' mean. Let me start by saying that the fact that there is a referendum is in itself a victory. Don't forget that the two referenda - the one based on three questions and the one aimed at preventing the privatization of the healthcare system which is currently at the petition stage - a total of nearly two million signatures have been collected. Two million! There is undoubtedly some overlap, we are still talking about almost a quarter of the Hungarian electorate. This is in itself a huge achievement. We have not simply been given the right and opportunity to vote in a referendum but we have had to fight for it. People were forced to struggle for over a year for something that was already their constitutional right. This, however, means that people think these questions are important, they feel that these are some of the most important issues in their lives, in which they are not prepared to give anybody else the right to decide for them. They are not prepared to give that right to experts, financial institutions or to politicians, because after all this is a question of knowledge and health. This is a real victory, and everybody in Hungary can be proud of it, regardless of their political preferences. I can also put it like this: representative democracy which requires our contribution only once every four years, when we vote is now complemented by an important element of participative democracy. Let's not hold ourselves back, let's not be intimidated by seemingly sublime words; the truth is that a referendum is the most highly developed example of a non-violent popular movement, and we have managed to realize this in Hungary.

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. President, whoever says ‘yes' on March 9 says ‘yes' to health, knowledge and responsible government, not only to the abolition of tuition fees, co-payments and daily hospital fees. Whoever says ‘yes' also says ‘yes' to economic change, growth and a successful future, and not only to the abandonment of harmful policies.

What does ‘no' mean? My friends, whoever votes ‘no' votes for submission. We would submit to not having health, not being qualified and not having responsible government. Whoever votes ‘no' hands over to the government the authority to continue as it has done up to now. What's more, whoever votes ‘no' makes the present situation even worse, since the government has obviously up to now pursued policies which are clearly in conflict with the wish of the electorate and for which it has not received a mandate. Now it could get the green-light for never-ending price and tax increases, new taxes and redundancies and believe me, the government can hardly wait to receive this authorization from Hungarians.

Please let's keep at the forefront of our minds that the stakes in the referendum have been raised since Monday. On Monday the Hungarian Parliament made two important decisions. The majority coalition accepted - now for the second time - the bill on the privatization of the healthcare system, and rejected the proposal for a confirmatory referendum on the bill. It rejected the possibility of a referendum on this important question, yet it knew perfectly well that people reject the privatization of the healthcare system - the proof of this is the huge amount of negative feedback from private individuals, professional bodies, surveys, petitions, and public opinion. I understand that the representatives of the governing coalition have obligations towards their own government, and I understand their commitment to the government. But I do not and cannot accept that, knowing the opinion of the public, and knowing it to be a negative opinion, someone should then prevent the public from being able to decide the fate of a bill in the form of a referendum which would put that bill to the test. Commitment to a government is a worthy concept, but that commitment should never overrule the commitment to democracy, as happened in the Hungarian Parliament on Monday. In the end, we will get to the point where many of us will see the truth in that bon mot, according to which the government, dissatisfied with the people, will have it replaced.

My dear friends, I'm convinced that a victory for the ‘yes' vote is a victory for hope over submission, a victory for the future over the futility of endless anticipation. I see the current fashion for rotation of ministers and state secretaries. Believe me, a cat can spin around faster and faster in pursuit of its own tail, but that doesn't mean that it will have any chance of success. This is also the case with our current government. This is why a victory for the ‘yes' vote in the referendum is a victory for the future over the futility of endless anticipation.

Finally, Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to return to the question of unity and consensus. Where did leave off? I more or less expressed it with the thought that what unites us, what links us to this nation is far more than that which divides us.

Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen, today the difference in life expectancies between a man living in the second district of Budapest and a man living in a village in the county of Nógrád is twelve years. This means that a man living in the second district lives twelve years longer than in a Nógrád village. One of them is a decent Western European average. The second, Ladies and Gentlemen, is the average in the Ukraine. If things go on like this, the difference will increase, and soon it will reach twenty years. This will one day result in a Hungary where a minority live - or at least feel as if they live - in apartments overlooking New York's Central Park. The majority will live - and feel as if they live - in the third world. I believe that in fact every citizen agrees, regardless of party loyalty, that we should avoid this and prevent it happening.

Ladies and gentlemen, if things go on like this, especially in the education and healthcare sectors, then people might start to form the misconception that dictatorship can give them more than freedom can. I know of course that the root of the problems is that those who are today constructing capitalism, who twenty years ago warned us against the evils of capitalism, are now constructing it in the image of the evil spectre they once portrayed it to be. But still, we who are here in this hall today all fought for the fall of Communism. I'm also a politician who fought for the fall of that system. I believe that it's better for everybody to belong to the free world, because it creates more opportunities than dictatorship. I also believe that in the free world there should be better education and healthcare systems then there were under dictatorship. I'd like to ask you not to reject the idea that freedom is always capable of more than dictatorship.

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. President, what will be the consequences of a victory for the ‘yes' vote? Perhaps this is the question most voters ask me when I meet them. What I can say for sure is that a victory for the ‘yes' vote will be the prelude to a new era. Don't let yourselves be misled by the opinion which seeks to refute this. Today those who say that the referendum will have no consequences are the same people who said there would not even be referendum, because it would be impossible to hold one on these issues. Well, ladies and gentlemen, a new era is dawning, because on March 9 people will be able to achieve success. To achieve success even if they have to in spite of the government. And don't forget, nothing like this has ever happened before. This can happen for the first time since the fall of Communism. A popular movement which achieves success in specific matters on which a government can be held to account. This is the day, March 9, when the country can show that it is able to stand on its own two feet. It can show that it won't submit to harmful government decisions ruining the life of its people. You also probably know from personal experience that the first success is always the most important. This brings with it the sweet smell of success, it always gives people confidence. If you succeed once, you'll succeed next time too. On 9th March 9 Hungary can set out on the road to change. Of course we know that every journey - even the longest journey - starts with the first step. How far we can go with the momentum of the first step, the first success, and how many stages are needed before we reach our ultimate success depend solely on you, the people.
The length of the first step is determined by the number of people voting and how they vote on March 9. One thing is sure: this journey on which we are now embarking leads to a truly important goal. It leads to the goal of Hungary having a government which only counts itself successful if its citizens are also successful.

Thank you for your attention.

All the way Hungary! All the way Hungarians!