Poland's Shipyard Saga Continues
Poland has been granted a reprieve by the European Commission and now has a new deadline of the 12th of September for submitting plans to restructure the Baltic shipyards or face having to return five billion zloty of illegal state aid.
The Polish government's struggles to meet the "final" deadline of 26th June proved to be in vain when the EC Competition Commissioner stated that the plans she received, the culmination of four years of efforts to work with the Polish government to find a positive solution for creating sustainable jobs and securing the long-term profitability of the shipyards without state aid, do not achieve that objective. Now Prime Minister Donald Tusk has a packed schedule of meetings with potential investors, some of whom have been in the running for a while, and others who have only come forward recently, from as far afield as Abu Dhabi, Norway and India. Whether a viable deal can be struck by the deadline remains to be seen.