“Engie must stop playing with the government’s feet. Negotiation is fine for a while, but when a multinational doesn’t care about a government, it’s over,” said the PS president. “When I was Minister of Energy I had a very simple plan which could never be implemented because at the time Alexander De Croo pulled the plug from the federal government but this plan is still there: Engie is forced to produce, at a fixed price, a certain quantity of nuclear electricity; the government buys this electricity at a price determined by the regulator and then resells it to individuals and businesses at a price lower than the current price,” he explained.
Last week, the president of the N-VA, Bart De Wever, accused the Minister of Energy Tinne Van der Straeten (Groen) of wanting to defeat the negotiation with Engie on the conditions for the extension of the Doel nuclear reactors 4 and Tihange 3. “Tinne Van der Straeten is negotiating to fail,” he said on the set of VTM, about the talks held since the beginning of spring by Minister Groen and Prime Minister Alexander De Croo with Engie, l French energy company which operates the power stations via Electrabel. The accusation had been refuted by environmentalists.
Tackles addressed to Charles Michel and Georges-Louis Bouchez
The president of the PS also made strong remarks against Charles Michel, president of the European Council whose work he calls into question. The socialist has indeed declared in his regard: “Apart from the ‘sofagate’, what has he done since he has been there?”
He was not kind either with the president of MR Georges-Louis Bouchez, who this week compared the tax administration to the Stasi, the GDR’s intelligence and political police service. “It’s amazing” , reacted Paul Magnette on Sunday. “It’s not for the average taxpayer. We must be able to give inspectors who must be able to do their job access to all the data to go and fight against major tax fraud.” And Magnette to add: “The MR has always protected tax evasion […] You will see that he [Georges-Louis Bouchez, NDLR] attacks all the means that are taken to fight against tax evasion. That’s the heart of the problem.”