New model of supervision over the companies owned by Polish State Treasury

Polish Prime Minister Beata Szydło in an interview for „Dziennik Gazeta Prawna” announced that the biggest State Treasury companies, currently supervised by the Minister of State Treasury, will soon come under the supervision of specific departments.

This will be the case for PZU, KGHM and Azoty, among others. The remaining companies will be supervised by a specialized agency run by a suitable manager. What is more, the agency itself will be answerable to the head of the government. The changes regarding appointment of a president on the basis of competition following which he/she would serve a specific office term.

In the same statement, Prime Minister Beata Szydło touched on the topic of introducing clear rules with respect to the process of appointing supervisory boards. She sees creation of a particular group of people the members of which would be appointed to the bodies, as a definitely positive solution. Selecting a proper group would fall within the competence of a body of experts appointed for that purpose.

Prime Minister Beata Szydło said she is aware the planned changes require highly developed audit. In the later part of her statement she stressed that government actions will not be directed at privatization solutions, and in the companies there will be room only for the people who guarantee that. The head of the government strongly criticized the occurrences of one person being appointed a member in several supervisory boards and expressed intention to fight this ill practice.

According to the announcement of Prime Minister Szydło, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Development will not be joined. The question is reasonable, especially taking into consideration the fact that for several days the Deputy Prime Minister who leads both ministries is one person – Mateusz Morawiecki. An important thing to note, is that he is also the head of the Economic Committee of the Council of Ministers.

Fragmentary statements from the head of the government on this topic appear to definitely disperse all doubts. She publicly stated that merging the two ministries would be for the outsiders a step raising many doubts, especially due to the immense importance of the ministry of finance in the context of cooperation with the EU.

This is the Ministry of Finance the Prime Minister Szydło described as „a guardian of budget discipline” – an indispensable tool of controlling the budget and public finances. She expressed a view that its efficient functioning determines not only the pace of development of Polish economy, but also the safety of public finances.