Polish government wins confidence vote after austerity plans

Nov 19, 2011, 12:02 GMT

Warsaw - The Polish government on Saturday narrowly won a confidence vote, a day after Prime Minister Donald Tusk laid out austerity plans to protect the county from the eurozone debt crisis.

234 parliamentarians voted in support of the government programme, 211 voted against and 2 abstained.

Members of the conservative opposition Law and Justice party (PiS) walked out briefly prior to the vote in protest at Tusk's linking them to football hooligans who have rioted in the past few weeks over new ID requirements for entering stadiums.

Despite the opposition voting against the government, Tusk said he was optimistic that a cross-party consensus could be found in at least some points of the austerity programme.

'I put forward a difficult and tough programme and the fact that I heard lots of words that sounded serious and showed readiness to cooperate is a good sign,' he said.

The new cabinet was sworn in on Friday. Tusk's centre-right Civic Platform won last month's elections and is continuing its coalition government with the agrarian Polish People's Party. They have a majority of 235 in the 460-seat parliament.

Tusk on Friday said his government was prepared to take 'unpopular actions' to guarantee the country's economic growth and stability, including raising the retirement age to 67 from 65 for men and 60 for women.