SPÖ regional party chairman Sven Hergovich has made the fight against inflation and more transparency in the Lower Austrian state government a priority. Too much money is being wasted in the system that could be better spent. He describes the black and blue coalition wedding in the krone.tv conversation with Jana Pasching as strange: “I’ve never been to a wedding like this.”
Lower Austria is the state with the highest income and therefore also the state in whose government the highest taxes flow. “Nevertheless, the black-blue state government of Lower Austria manages to ensure that there are fewer facilities for its own population.” Vienna invests four times as much in public transport every year and has long had the free all-day kindergarten , in Burgenland they have stopped heating costs and introduced a ceiling on the minimum wage. So Hergovich’s goal is to do all this in Lower Austria and prevent so much money from seeping into the system. “As a country, we spend 500 million euros annually on subsidies and no one checks who is paid and whether double or triple payments are made.”
SPÖ demand: “Interest charges must be capped”
Hergovich also calls for more intervention in the market, for example to make housing affordable again: Watch how interest rates on loans explode and banks make record profits. Savings rates remain low while interest rates on loans are rising. The demand that Hergovich first presented: “Just as heating costs in Burgenland are now capped, interest rates must also be intervened and interest costs capped.” The goal: “No homebuilder in this country should pay more than three percent interest. It cannot be that the banks are the silent beneficiaries of the crisis that no one is talking about.”
The governor of Lower Austria, Johanna Mikl-Leitner, had to defend herself several times in recent weeks for the cooperation between black and blue in Lower Austria because there was also criticism. How is the partnership going, from the Reds’ point of view? This “coalition marriage” of both parties happened in an interesting way for Hergovich, “because you didn’t vote for each other”. “You step in front of the altar and the pastor asks you if you want to get married, both say no and you are married anyway. I’ve been to a lot of weddings, but I’ve never been to a wedding like this in my life.”
You can see the entire conversation with Sven Hergovich in the video above.
Source: Krone
I am Ida Scott, a journalist and content author with a passion for uncovering the truth. I have been writing professionally for Today Times Live since 2020 and specialize in political news. My career began when I was just 17; I had already developed a knack for research and an eye for detail which made me stand out from my peers.
