To change the social agreement, consensus must first be reached with the miners’ trade unions, not by peddling nonsense that it can be altered without the approval of President Karol Nawrocki. What does the President of the Republic have to do with this agreement? He was neither a party to it, nor was he even president when it was signed – says Jarosław Grzesik, head of the National Secretariat for Mining and Energy of NSZZ “Solidarność,” lashing out at Energy Minister Miłosz Motyka.
In a recent episode of Elektryfikacja, a podcast hosted by Energetyka24’s editor-in-chief Jakub Wiech, Minister Motyka declared that the social contract with miners to phase out coal by 2049 “must be revised” because “economics are ruthless.”
“We won’t fool miners – especially union leaders – with slogans about pumping billions into unprofitable projects. In the long term, this agreement will have to be updated. There will be a revision,” Motyka said.
Government spokesperson silent again
Attempts to verify Motyka’s statement with Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s press office went nowhere. Government spokesman Adam Szłapka did not respond to inquiries—just as he had previously ignored questions about who steelworkers should now address their demands to, after the Ministry of Industry in Katowice was dissolved during the July cabinet reshuffle.
“This is scapegoating miners”
“The social agreement was hammered out with great difficulty and signed in 2021 between the government and the miners’ unions,” Grzesik reminds us. “The 2049 deadline was already a huge concession. Nowhere else in Europe have unions agreed to such a rapid cut in production and mine closures while deposits are still viable. In Germany, the phase-out has been stretched over a much longer period with far greater state support. Minister Motyka’s claim that the deal can be changed without the president’s consent is pure mockery. The president, neither Nawrocki nor his predecessor Andrzej Duda, was a party to this agreement. Either the minister doesn’t understand how social dialogue works, or he’s completely detached from reality. This is nothing more than reviving old rhetoric—painting miners once again as society’s ‘villains.’”
“Coal energy is the cheapest”
Grzesik stresses that energy security—just like military or food security—has a cost. “We should rely on the resources we have: hard coal and lignite. Globally, coal remains the cheapest source of energy. Only in Europe do artificial taxes, the Green Deal, and the ETS make it expensive. Meanwhile, Germany is allowed to cut down forests to expand lignite mines and even build new coal plants, while Poland is ordered to shut its own mines and surrender energy security to foreign suppliers. The EU has already driven heavy industry out of Europe. What comes next?”
“Motyka is just a kid”
Grzegorz Matusiak, PiS MP, former miner at JSW’s “Zofiówka” colliery and strike veteran of 1988, is even blunter: “With Motyka it’s like ‘taking a hoe to the moon.’ This is a kid who’s never worked in a factory, yet wants to take away miners’ livelihoods. Poland still doesn’t have a nuclear plant. Without coal, how does he intend to guarantee stable energy for Poles? Last year, Sweden ran out of renewable power and had to ask Poland for help. Do we also want to rely on begging neighbors when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine? Unacceptable! Poland doesn’t have oil or gas—we have coal, and we must base our security on it.”
Matusiak warns that a large miners’ protest in Warsaw is imminent: “I think it’s inevitable.”