Government negotiations

Hummer: “There are very clear red lines for us”

Doris Hummer, President of the Upper Austrian Chamber of Commerce and Chairwoman of the Upper Austrian Economic Association.

(Bild: Wenzel Markus)

She was part of the government negotiations that ultimately collapsed and lends her voice to the business community in Upper Austria: Doris Hummer. She is concerned about the growing mood of crisis in the country and the new constellation for the future federal government. She is calling for a "change of course", a "relief package" for businesses and an end to the watering can principle.

The renovation bonus and the get-out-of-gas-and-oil subsidy expired in the last few weeks of the year - the outcry was sometimes huge. If Doris Hummer has her way, the new federal government should either no longer issue subsidies like these in future or scrutinize them critically. "If individual topics and technologies are subsidized, this leads to an increase in the cost of the technology and to a bottleneck - that's not smart," says the President of the Upper Austrian Chamber of Commerce. As chairwoman of the 18,000-member Economic Association in Upper Austria, which in turn is a sub-organization of the ÖVP, Hummer spoke plainly on Tuesday morning about...

• The end of the government negotiations: 
  "We need a support program for the location, a relief program, but we have now lost time again. We have lost very important time that the economy does not have. This also annoys us as representatives of the interests of the economy, especially because in the end it was purely ideological issues that prevented the agreement from being reached."

These repair subsidies of the past were the wrong way to go. Acting with a watering can was very expensive at the end of the day.

Doris Hummer bezieht klare Position

• The call for a relief package: 
  "I would rather see an end with horror than horror without end. We need a relief package so that this turnaround, which we urgently need in our business location, can be achieved. This includes bureaucracy, wage and energy costs and taxes."

Today we have a tax system that rewards less work, but we need to get back to a society that is willing to perform.

Doris Hummer fordert Anpassungen

• Red lines in the government negotiations:
  "For us, there are must-haves in the negotiations, but there are also red lines. For us, leaving the European Union is one such red line that we are not even discussing. We need a strong European Union, especially in the power blocs between the USA and China. We need a strong foreign trade, we live from exports in this country. New taxes on wealth and inheritance are also a red line. We do not support this program to drive out entrepreneurs."

The Wirtschaftsbund Oberösterreich commissioned IMAS International to conduct a mood check among local entrepreneurs.

(Bild: Krone KREATIV/Stock Adobe)

• The demand for a reduction in bureaucracy: 
  "There needs to be an authority, a lawyer or a state secretary in Austria who only deals with what can be done away with every day. As soon as a new law is passed, two others have to go. Companies have to deal with so many regulations and bureaucracy, which ties up time and resources, but it doesn't result in a new job."

• Educational leave: 
  "We have subsidies that make no sense. Educational leave, for example, is a support program that is a good idea. But the system has allowed parental leave to be extended, mostly in courses that took place online, without compulsory attendance and without compulsory completion. We paid unemployment benefit for these people. That is not acceptable. We have to be honest with people."