Austrian Elections & Politics 5.0 (Burgenland state election - January 26)

[Tender Branson]

For the first time since 1974, Austria had a budget surplus in 2018:

http://www.statistik.at/web_en/press/120562.html

That's according to the Maastricht definition, which includes the federal government budget, the state, the municipal and social insurance budgets.

Debt as a % of GDP dropped by more than 4% to 73.8% last year.

If Jan. 2019 is an indicator, the budget situation in 2019 will be even better:

In January, Bavaria paid back 1.3 billion € to Austria for the bad bank HETA and income + VAT tax revenues are also up by 6%.

It seems 2019 could see a budget surplus of 1% of GDP, far more than ÖVP-FPÖ are planning.

Debt will very likely drop to below 70% of GDP again and below 60% by 2022.

[Tender Branson]

How Austria's big cities are currently being governed (latest mayor and city council results):



Pretty much an SPÖVP thing, but the Greens won Innsbruck recently and the FPÖ is in charge of the medium-sized city of Wels.

[Tender Branson]

As I have posted elsewhere already (in the Christchurch attack thread), the FPÖ is in a bit of trouble recently:

The National Security Council will meet tonight, initiated by the SPÖ and Now. ÖVP+FPÖ have to explain to them the connections and investigation details/updates of the New Zealand terrorist to the far-right Identitarians. The Identitarians are a "talent agency" for the FPÖ and many of their members are recruited by the FPÖ.



Martin Sellner, their leader, is one of the most influential right-wing extremists in Europe and has previously said that he only received a 1.500€ donation from the NZ terrorist and there were no further talks between them. But in a NYT interview, Sellner recently said that "there might have been a few emails back and forth between them and that he forwarded Tarrant's email to his huge follower base."

State prosecution have raided Sellner's apartment recently and seized his IT hardware for examination and launched an effort to dissolve the Identitarians.

Over the weekend it also turned out that the FPÖ and the Identitarians share a villa in Linz as office space.

Also, many western intelligence services are now very reluctant to share their data with the Kickl-FPÖ-Interior Ministry because of this stuff and want to forward their data directly to Chancellor Kurz instead.



https://derstandard.at/2000100581625/Pruefung-der-Aufloesung-von-Identitaeren-laeuft

[Tender Branson]

Liberal NEOS-leader Beate Meinl-Reisinger has given birth to a baby girl over the weekend:

 

She's the 2nd party leader (together with FPÖ-Strache) to get a child in the last few months and the 3rd (incl. cabinet members) over the past year.

[Tender Branson]

IFES/Demox poll:

„I would be strongly/somewhat annoyed if the following groups of people were my neighbors.“



LOL @ the fact that 1% of Austrians are annoyed to have Austrians as their neighbors.

[Tender Branson]

  Tender, I wonder where other eastern Europeans would fit in the poll, like Czechs, Hungarians and Poles. Probably in the high single digits?

I would assume so. They are seen roughly as former Yugoslavs (11%).

[Tender Branson]

VIENNA, April 3 (Reuters) - Austria has increased the size of its planned tax targeting tech companies, to 5 percent of their advertising revenue in the country, from 3 percent previously, Finance Minister Hartwig Loeger said in an interview with ORF radio on Wednesday.

The planned levy, which starts next year, is part of a package of measures targeting large tech companies including Google, Amazon and Facebook, which Austria’s right-wing government accuses of not paying their fair share in taxes.

The planned measures also include lowering the threshold for value-added tax to apply to packages entering the country, as previously announced. Loeger told ORF the various measures were expected to raise more than 200 million euros ($224.44 million) a year.

https://www.reuters.com/article/austria-economy-digital-tax/austria-increasing-size-of-planned-digital-tax-finance-minister-says-idUSV9N1YO002

Good.

Internet companies need to pay their fair share of taxes.

[Tender Branson]

Very good results for the Faction of Socialist Unionists (FSG) in the Austrian union employee elections:

https://kurier.at/chronik/niederoesterreich/fsg-baut-absolute-mehrheit-in-aknoe-aus/400456069

The states of Vorarlberg, Tyrol and Salzburg have already voted a few weeks ago and now another 5 states have released their results and the FSG maintained their 60-75% majorities and even gained ground in some states, such as Upper Austria, Lower Austria and Vienna.

[Tender Branson]

The Identitarian problem continued today for ÖVP-FPÖ (only for the FPÖ of course):

https://kurier.at/politik/inland/nach-telefonat-kurz-kunasek-erneut-sperre-im-heer-fuer-identitaere/400456702

The "Standard" newspaper uncovered recently that the Austrian Army under the FPÖ Defense Minister Kunasek has stopped blacklisting and therefore banning far-right people from joining the army, as was the case for decades - so that these people do not infiltrate the army and get weapons training for free.

Chancellor Kurz and President Van der Bellen then called Kunasek today and lectured him that extremism has no place in the Army, which he then also told the media and also announced that the ban has been put into effect again.

All of this is also campaign tactics for the upcoming EU elections of course: Kurz is sounding like the tough Chancellor guy who wants to show the voters who's boss and who's not. Experts think that this will help the ÖVP in the elections, while the FPÖ will fall back in the polls.

[Tender Branson]

If I were an Austrian I'd be very unhappy with the ongoing ÖVP bullying of the FPÖ. Does Kurz want to return to governing with the SPÖ and get electorally demolished for pushing the same old leftist line on immigration and integration? At this point Strache should threaten to pull the plug if the ÖVP continue to do this.

I don't see a problem if the FPÖ cuts their ties with the most extreme fringes of society, as long as they are in government.

Why do you think the ÖVP is "bullying" them ? It's just that Kurz wants them to be within the legal framework, so that they can continue to govern without any harm domestically and abroad.

It's better for both of them. The FPÖ will continue to poll above 20% anyway as an anti-establishment party, even if they get rid of their Nazi elements within.

[Tender Branson]

Tomorrow we should get a new Research Affairs poll, which could show first effects of the Identitarian/Tarrant fallout for the FPÖ ...

Research Affairs tends to be a bit biased anyway in favour of the FPÖ (but not by a lot), so if the FPÖ is at 24-25% tomorrow, everything is fine, 22-23% would be a modest loss because of the issue and everything below 22% would be a major drop.

In general, FPÖ-voters don't give much of a damn about these Identitarian things and the base has become die-hard over the past years, so I don't expect the polls to change a lot.

[Tender Branson]

Here are the results of the new Research Affairs poll and it shows the FPÖ already dropping:



https://www.oe24.at/oesterreich/politik/Umfrage-Identitaere-schaden-der-FPOe/374872829

Poll was conducted March 28-April 3, so it does not capture the full fallout for the FPÖ yet. I think they will go down to 20% in other new polls soon.

Just today, it emerged that Identitarian movement leader Martin Sellner put swastika stickers on a synagogue in 2006 as a 17-year old, for which he had to perform 100 hours of community service at a Jewish cemetary. Sellner said he was a neo-Nazi back then, but has "changed a lot" since then.



https://www.kleinezeitung.at/politik/innenpolitik/5607530/Identitaere_Martin-Sellner-klebte-Hakenkreuze-auf-Synagoge

[Tender Branson]

Austria far-right activist condemned over swastika

Austria's chancellor has described as "disgusting" revelations that a far-right activist linked to the New Zealand mosque attacks suspect put a swastika on a synagogue when he was 17. Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said he would not tolerate "neo-Nazi activities". Martin Sellner of the Identitarian Movement Austria said the incident had been long ago and he had since changed. Last month investigators raided his home after he said he had been given money by the Christchurch suspect. But Mr Sellner, 30, denied any involvement in the New Zealand attacks. Fifty people died and dozens more wounded in the 15 March shootings. Australian Brenton Tarrant, a 28-year-old self-proclaimed white supremacist, has been charged over the attacks. Mr Kurz - who campaigned on a harsh anti-immigrant message and is governing in coalition with the far-right Freedom Party - said that as chancellor it was his duty to "fight all forms of extremism to preserve free and liberal law-based state". It follows a report in Austria's Kleine Zeitung that Mr Sellner had admitted to police in 2006 that he and a companion stuck a swastika poster on a synagogue in the town of Baden bei Wien, to the south-west of the capital Vienna. The newspaper quoted Mr Sellner's companion as saying the pair had decided to carry out the act after British Holocaust denier David Irving was arrested in Austria in 2005 and jailed. Denying the Holocaust is illegal in Austria. Mr Sellner had also provided a badge saying "aryan youth" and an anti-Turkish poster, his companion said at the time. Mr Sellner appeared regretful and was told to carry out 100 hours of community service in a Jewish cemetery, the newspaper report said. Responding to the report on Twitter, Mr Sellner said it was no secret that he had been active in the neo-Nazi scene when he was younger but had "left that behind a long time ago". He had never taken part in acts of violence, he added. Mr Sellner has become one of the most prominent young activists of the far right in Europe. Austrian media say the far-right Freedom Party has come under pressure to distance itself from the Identitarian Movement Austria (IBÖ) following the revelations that Brenton Tarrant donated about €1,500 (£1,290; $1,700) to the IBÖ.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-47822454

David, you cannot defend this. The FPÖ needs to cut all ties with these people to remain a "responsible" coalition party. Kurz is right here to demand a red line and zero tolerance.

[Tender Branson]

The FPÖ failed yesterday with a lawsuit against Austria (!), when a judge threw out their case for a 4 million € compensation for the 2016 presidential election runoff, which had to be repeated (... mostly, because the FPÖ didn't accept the close results).

Austrian voters found that lawsuit highly absurd, as a new ATV poll showed, with voters being opposed to a refund for the FPÖ by a 60-19 margin.

https://kurier.at/politik/inland/bp-wahl-2016-kein-anspruch-auf-schadenersatz-fuer-die-fpoe/400458106

The FPÖ and Strache also wanted to put to rest the Identitarian controversy today at the Upper Austria state convention, when Strache said that "A red line has been drawn by us with regards to the Identitarians, all ties with them have been cut, we don't want extremists in our party, or any connections with Martin Sellner, that the Left tries to construct something against the party by linking them to a crazy NZ mass murderer and that he will defend his party like a father would against all attacks."

Chancellor Kurz applauded Strache's remarks today at the FPÖ convention.



BTW:

Manfred Haimbuchner, the Upper Austrian FPÖ-leader and most likely successor to Strache, was re-elected with more than 97% of the delegate votes.

https://orf.at/stories/3117858

[Tender Branson]

UK, Dutch intelligence limit Austria data flow over Russian ties:MP

British and Dutch spy agencies have heavily restricted the amount of intelligence they share with Austria, mainly because of ties between the ruling far-right Freedom Party and Russia, an Austrian opposition lawmaker said on Tuesday.

...

Kurz has said he plans to make the BVT report to him and FPO Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache although it would still remain part of the Interior Ministry.

The BVT is not currently taking part in working groups of the Club of Bern, a network of European intelligence agencies, because of concerns among members about a club memo that was leaked to an Austrian newspaper, the head of the BVT said last week. He added, however, that Austria remains a member.

Yeah.

But it would be better if foreign intelligence groups would still warn us if for example they have knowledge of a coming terror attack in Austria. Otherwise it would look kinda bad on their part ...

Plus: we already knew in 2017 that they would limit their flow to the FPÖ-led Interior Ministry because of their pro-Russia ties. Nothing new really. They should just report to Kurz instead (not even Strache, Kurz can tell Strache the important parts) and the case is solved. The FPÖ needs to be sidelined here.

[Tender Branson]

UK, Dutch intelligence limit Austria data flow over Russian ties:MP

British and Dutch spy agencies have heavily restricted the amount of intelligence they share with Austria, mainly because of ties between the ruling far-right Freedom Party and Russia, an Austrian opposition lawmaker said on Tuesday.

...

Kurz has said he plans to make the BVT report to him and FPO Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache although it would still remain part of the Interior Ministry.

The BVT is not currently taking part in working groups of the Club of Bern, a network of European intelligence agencies, because of concerns among members about a club memo that was leaked to an Austrian newspaper, the head of the BVT said last week. He added, however, that Austria remains a member.

Yeah.

But it would be better if foreign intelligence groups would still warn us if for example they have knowledge of a coming terror attack in Austria. Otherwise it would look kinda bad on their part ...

Plus: we already knew in 2017 that they would limit their flow to the FPÖ-led Interior Ministry because of their pro-Russia ties. Nothing new really. They should just report to Kurz instead (not even Strache, Kurz can tell Strache the important parts) and the case is solved. The FPÖ needs to be sidelined here.

The important bits are the stuff they don’t want to give to the Russians. It simple really, either get woke or get cast in the dark, NATO isn’t budging to put itself in risk just because you democratically voted in fifth-columnists.

That’s why the easiest solution for this would be to report the Russia-related stuff only to Chancellor Kurz and the remaining stuff to the FPÖ-led Interior Ministry ...

[Tender Branson]

UK, Dutch intelligence limit Austria data flow over Russian ties:MP

British and Dutch spy agencies have heavily restricted the amount of intelligence they share with Austria, mainly because of ties between the ruling far-right Freedom Party and Russia, an Austrian opposition lawmaker said on Tuesday.

...

Kurz has said he plans to make the BVT report to him and FPO Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache although it would still remain part of the Interior Ministry.

The BVT is not currently taking part in working groups of the Club of Bern, a network of European intelligence agencies, because of concerns among members about a club memo that was leaked to an Austrian newspaper, the head of the BVT said last week. He added, however, that Austria remains a member.

Yeah.

But it would be better if foreign intelligence groups would still warn us if for example they have knowledge of a coming terror attack in Austria. Otherwise it would look kinda bad on their part ...

Plus: we already knew in 2017 that they would limit their flow to the FPÖ-led Interior Ministry because of their pro-Russia ties. Nothing new really. They should just report to Kurz instead (not even Strache, Kurz can tell Strache the important parts) and the case is solved. The FPÖ needs to be sidelined here.

The important bits are the stuff they don’t want to give to the Russians. It simple really, either get woke or get cast in the dark, NATO isn’t budging to put itself in risk just because you democratically voted in fifth-columnists.

That’s why the easiest solution for this would be to report the Russia-related stuff only to Chancellor Kurz and the remaining stuff to the FPÖ-led Interior Ministry ...

And if some of that info runs tangentially to Russian stuff? For all purposes, leaving Austria in the dark is a good move so as to not have a leaky foundation.

In this case, the BVT needs to be put under the supervision of the Chancellery, instead of the Interior Ministry. Problem: the FPÖ would not vote for it unless Kurz threatens to blow up the coalition.

Either that, or Kurz should receive the full data load from abroad. Leaving Austria in the dark about the Russians is not cool.

[Tender Branson]

As long as the foreign spy groups warn us a day before Russia plans to invade us, everything should be fine ...

Everything else is negligible.

[Tender Branson]

New "Profil" magazine poll by Unique Research has the FPÖ dropping and the SPÖ gaining:

34% ÖVP (n.c.)
28% SPÖ (+3)
22% FPÖ (-2)
  7% NEOS (-1)
  5% Greens (n.c.)
  2% NOW (n.c.)
  2% Others (n.c.)

61% of voters do not think the disassociation of the FPÖ from the far-right Identitarians is convincing enough.

https://www.ots.at/presseaussendung/OTS_20190413_OTS0003/profil-umfrage-kanzlerfrage-kurz-zieht-davon-profitiert-von-identitaeren-machtwort

[Tender Branson]

100-200 Identitarians held a demo today in Vienna incl. Martin Sellner:



About 2.000-5.000 protested against them:



Both demos concluded peacefully, thanks to the massive police presence.

https://derstandard.at/2000101362650/Identitaere-Kundgebung-und-Gegendemo-in-Wien

[Tender Branson]

Combined Austria-wide results of the union vote, representing the 4 million Austrian employees have been released and the FSG (Faction of Socialist Unionists) increased their dominant position by 3.3%, whereas the ÖVP-, FPÖ- and Green-affiliated unionists all lost ground or remained stable. 7 of the 9 states were won by the FSG, 2 are historically dominated by the ÖVP unionists. Roughly 2 million of the 4 million workers took part in the union vote in the previous months. This is good news for the SPÖ because it could mean a revival of their base ahead of the EU elections:

[Tender Branson]

In the 1st quarter of 2019, new asylum requests dropped by 30% compared with Q1, 2018:

Jan-March 2019: 2.881 new requests
Jan-March 2018: 4.050 new requests

The main countries of those with new requests are unchanged though:

* Syria, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Russia (Chechnya).

While the number of new requests is still high (ca. 12.000 expected for the whole year), it could be for the first time that there will be more deportations this year than new requests, which is exactly what Austrians want.

Only if there are more deportations than new requests, will the massive stockpile of asylum seekers from recent years start to decline ...

The best thing would be if there are just 5.000 new asylum requests a year and 15.000 deportations. Then their stockpile would decline by about 10.000 per year.

We already have enough immigration from the EU and other countries anyway, excluding all the asylum requests.

At least the policies on asylum/immigration by the ÖVP/FPÖ government are heading in the right direction: finally working for the Austrian people and not for the pro-asylum/immigration lobby.

https://www.kleinezeitung.at/politik/innenpolitik/5612466/Seit-Jahresbeginn_Die-Zahl-der-Asylantraege-in-Oesterreich-geht

[Tender Branson]

Austrian central bank says government threatens its financial independence

Conservative Chancellor Sebastian Kurz’s government, which includes the far-right Freedom Party, announced plans last year to reform banking supervision in Austria, which is currently split between the Financial Market Authority and the central bank.

It says the plan, which will shift 180 jobs to the FMA from the Austrian National Bank (ONB) and do away with one of the two FMA co-chiefs’ jobs, will make for a more streamlined structure and save money.

The central bank, however, said the plan would make banking supervision more complicated and expensive.

“It is to be feared that supervision costs in Austria will increase as a result of these new, complicated structures, taking into account in particular the creation of three new sections in the Finance Ministry,” the ONB said in a statement.

Rip Austria’s long-term growth and financial stability. I wonder though who will be the Austrian Herman Cain?

It is no surprise that a new government tries to re-colour certain agencies with people from their side. Therefore a lot of agencies with SPÖ-members on them (from the SPÖVP coalition) are now replaced with more ÖVP-FPÖ people instead. If SPÖ people are removed, obviously the SPÖ will cry foul and fear for independence ...

But reading the article here, it seems more like a balanced mini-reform, rather than something big or controversial:

https://derstandard.at/2000101457521/Regierung-entfernt-bei-Umbau-der-Finanzmarktaufsicht-SP-nahen-Vorstand

Also, I don’t see Austria’s long term growth or financial stability threatened because of it. The biggest influence comes from Finance Minister Löger (ÖVP) and he’s doing a good job.

[Tender Branson]

Also, the Central Bank is „fuming“ and fearing for their independence, because they will have to pay a higher dividend to the state under the new government plans.

I don’t see anything bad here. It is better in my opinion to milk the central bank for more revenues rather than the taxpayers. If they optimize their investment strategy, everything should be OK ...

[Tender Branson]

Former ÖVP-leader Reinhold Mitterlehner is out with a new book in which he fully attacks current ÖVP-Chancellor Kurz and his rise to power and how he bullied out Mitterlehner as leader of the party.

Mitterlehner accuses Kurz of planning his rise to power for years already (no surprise) in a Macchiavellian way, full of intrigues against Mitterlehner and his people and says Kurz is a door-opener for the far-right populists: