The Prime Minister believed that the big test of the PSD’s credibility is whether or not it respects the agreement reached with the government on an imminent decision on the location of Lisbon’s new airport.
António Costa spoke in an interview with TVI, after being asked how he views the recent decision by the president of the PSD, Luís Montenegro, to create an internal working group to address the issue of the location of the new airport Lisbon must study. the Independent Technical Commission (CTI) has released its preliminary report.
“The airport issue is the great test of the credibility of the PPD/PSD,” he said, then referred to the agreement he reached with Luís Montenegro to set up a CTI without any element required by the government or by the social democrats has been appointed to provide scientific soundness, future political decision.
Later, in the same interview, António Costa was asked what could be his biggest regret from his eight years as Prime Minister. He then returned to the issue of a decision on the future Lisbon airport.
“Look, finally, if the PSD does not keep its promise, I would say that it trusted that we could work together to reach a consensus decision on a basic infrastructure for the country, such as the future airport,” he stated.
At this point, the Prime Minister reiterated that the former President of the Republic Cavaco Silva came to give consensus on the construction of an airport in Alcochete, as now proposed by the CTI, but that this solution was abandoned by the executive of Passos Coelho, which passed while defending Portela and Montijo.
In order not to postpone this issue any longer, António Costa said that despite criticism within the PS, he decided to maintain the option of Passos Coelho, which later ultimately did not deserve the consensus of former PSD president Rui Rio.
“Even with the PS’s absolute majority in parliament, I decided to look for a consensus solution with the PSD president. We worked on a comfortable solution. And I don’t know of a more independent way to form a technical committee,” he added. .
In the interview, António Costa maintained his idea of privatizing more than 50% of TAP, but noted that the President of the Republic had vetoed this government decree and that there are no longer political conditions for revisiting the issue.
In terms of economics, he argued that national businesspeople must do more to be competitive in hiring, even hinting at “a salary shock for young people”.
Faced with the fact that he had not reached an agreement with the teachers, he countered that in recent years “and in a smaller number, more than 80%” of teachers “have moved up two levels since one of their governments imposed the freeze on the levels.
Regarding the latest PISA results, he started by arguing that the decline in Portugal is in line with most OECD countries, that this decline was due to two academic years marked by Covid-19, but conceded that there is still much more to be done in the field of the economy. the recovery of learning.
Source: DN
