Poland to trade UK welfare for Nato bases

Poland has said it is willing to trade British welfare rights for UK support for Nato bases, as the country edges closer to pariah status in the EU over domestic reforms.

Its foreign minister, Witold Waszczykowski, put forward the UK bargain in an interview with the Reuters news agency in Warsaw on Sunday (3 January).

Asked if there was anything Britain could do to soften Polish opposition to its idea of freezing EU migrant welfare benefits - part of the British demands ahead of an In/Out EU referendum - Waszczykowski said: “Of course. Britain could offer something to Poland in terms of international security.”

“We still consider ourselves a second-class Nato member state, because in central Europe ... there aren't, aside from a token presence, any significant allied forces or defence installations, which gives the Russians an excuse to play in this region.”

He said the Polish government, elected in October, is to increase welfare and salaries at home to offset potential UK restrictions.

But he added: “It would be very difficult for us to accept any discrimination [against Polish workers] … unless Britain helped us really effectively with regard to the Polish defence ambitions at the summit in Warsaw.”

Poland is to host a meeting of Nato leaders in its capital city in July.

Nato is already creating new facilities in the Baltic states, Bulgaria, Poland, and Romania as part of a rapid reaction force to deter Russian aggression.

The facilities are to act as “command and control” centres. Separate facilities are to warehouse heavy armour, including US tanks, so they can be deployed more quickly. Nato states are also posting extra troops to the region on a temporary or “rotational” basis.

Previous Polish governments have called for permanent bases which host between 3,000 and 5,000 troops each, on the model of Cold War-era US facilities in Western Germany.

But Russia says it would violate a 1997 treaty on Nato’s presence in former Iron Curtain countries.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin, on 31 December, also signed a new National Security Strategy which names the US and Nato as “threats to national security” because they’re “moving military infrastructure closer to Russia’s borders.”

EU angst

Poland’s UK bargain augurs a rift in eastern Europe.

Poland has previously joined the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Slovakia - the so-called Visegrad club - in opposing “discriminatory” welfare restrictions.

But Waszczykowski’s government has bigger fish to fry in terms of EU problems.

Speaking to the FAZ daily in Germany also on Sunday, the German EU commissioner, Gunther Oettinger, said Poland should face special scrutiny, leading to potential suspension of its EU Council voting rights.

“Many reasons exist for us to activate the ‘rule of law mechanism' and for us to place Warsaw under monitoring,” he said.

He singled out a new media law, adopted by Polish MPs last week, which would let the treasury minister fire directors of state TV and radio broadcasters, extending political control over media.

“A director cannot be dismissed without cause. It would be arbitrary,” Oettinger said.

13 January showdown

The media law comes after Poland, also in December, adopted reforms to its highest court, the Constitutional Tribunal, allowing the government to install loyalist judges and making it harder for the court to block new laws.

The European Commission has, in letters to Warsaw, criticised the media and constitutional changes and plans to hold a debate on the situation at its first New Year meeting, on 13 January.

Oettinger’s threat refers to article 7 in the EU treaty, which says Council voting rights can be suspended if there’s a “serious and persistent breach” of common values and rule of law.

The threat was previously invoked when a far-right party joined a coalition government in Austria 15 years ago.

Left-leaning and liberal MEPs have also called for an article 7 procedure against Hungary, due to judicial and media curbs by the government of PM Viktor Orban.