Since this morning, public debate has been dominated by revelations about how some of the funds from the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP, KPO) have been spent. So much so that Prime Minister Donald Tusk addressed the issue himself, declaring that “he will not accept any waste of National Recovery and Resilience Plan funds.” Well then, how else would you describe a tanning bed in a pizzeria…?
During today’s press conference, Donald Tusk decided to comment on what has been heating up social media since the early hours – the scandal surrounding the spending of NRRP funds.
At first, rather clumsily trying to explain the issue, he attacked the previous ruling party. You could say – nothing new.
“A fraction of the NRRP funds was intended to compensate for losses suffered by the hotel and restaurant industry during the pandemic. I understand the intentions of our predecessors when they designed these programs,” he said.
Tusk on the NRRP scandal
However, he quickly added that “he will not accept any waste of NRRP funds.” “I want the audit to quickly lead to a thorough evaluation of every single złoty spent under this project,” he announced. “Where an expense was unjustified, I will expect swift decisions, including reclaiming the funds wherever they were misused,” he said.
Scandal over NRRP spending
Government websites published a map of grants from the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, showing subsidies awarded to the HoReCa sector. The list includes many truly bizarre and controversial projects.
These include funding for a tanning bed in a pizzeria, a “house on water” for business meetings, mobile coffee machines, a yacht, and support for one company to expand its offer with “nutritional alcohol-free beer.”
One business, for instance, received over 300,000 złoty for an e-learning platform teaching how to play bridge. Some applications are even more absurd – in some cases, the only thing entered under “project title” was the company’s name, and yet they were still awarded funding.