According to the plans, the new authority that will control the operation of the battery factories and other important industrial facilities will be established by September, said Zsolt Tárkányi, the member of parliament of the Tisza Party and the parliamentary secretary of the Ministry of Transport and Investments on Saturday in an interview with Debreciner. In case of serious violations, this authority will be able to fine the companies involved in billions of dollars, and in the last case, it will be able to take away all their licenses, which in practice means their closure.
In the interview, Tárkányi also talked about the fact that they are still working on the creation of the relevant legislation, but according to the plans, he will be one of its submitters as an individual representative. The authority will fall under the Ministry Responsible for the Living Environment led by László Gajdos.
Although he did not name a specific amount, according to Tárkányi, both he and László Gajdos are thinking of billions in fines for potentially serious violations of regulations by potentially polluting plants. “The new authority will be able to issue dissuasive penalties”, said the representative from Debrecen, who said that the new authority will not replace the government offices, but instead will work in parallel with them.
According to Tárkányi, the new authority will be able to temporarily suspend the operation of repeat offenders, for example for a few weeks or 1-2 months. If they commit serious pollution again after such cases, they can even have all their permits taken away and have to start obtaining permits all over again, which means permanent closure of the factory.
Debreciner asked whether the new government wants to be a partner in building the battery industry plants that have been announced but not yet implemented. Tárkányi said that his short answer is that no, they do not want new battery plants to be built in the country, and they also do not want CATL to implement the second and third factories planned for Debrecen.
In the interview, Tárkányi also said that, according to their plans, they can reopen the it closed last fallrailway line 106 running between Debrecen and Nagykereki. Although the tracks have already been removed for a short section, the lane next to the tracks is still legally owned by the state, and the new government plans to keep it that way.
Regarding their plans in this regard, he said: in his “dreams” they will rebuild and renovate the part of line 106 that was previously taken up to Nagyvárad, and then make it suitable for traffic at 80-100 kilometers per hour. They would look for a new route for the line at Mikepércs, so that it can serve the local population as well as the factories. According to him, the goal would be to introduce line 106 into downtown Debrecen like a tram-train.
One of Tisza’s important promises in the election campaign was to fix the Debrecen Main Station. In this regard, Tárkányi has now said: besides regulating battery factories, this is his number one project as a representative, but first of all, it is necessary to carefully plan what they want to build and how, which will not happen overnight. According to him, even in the ideal case, construction could only begin by 2030.
You can watch the full interview here:
