Polish Minister Agnieszka Dziemianowicz-Bąk warned Prime Minister Donald Tusk of potential loss of billions from EU recovery fund if labor reforms aren’t implemented.
Initial Labor Reform Rejected
At the beginning of January, the government rejected a draft law prepared by the Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Policy that would have reformed the State Labour Inspectorate (PIP). The legislation would have allowed changing fictional work agreements, contracts for specific tasks, or B2B contracts into employment contracts based on an administrative decision. It also provided for an option to appeal to the Chief Labour Inspector and ultimately to court.
“The possibility of changing the form of employment by an official without asking the employer or the employee, and without a court judgment, is a bad idea. Our task is to free the economy and citizens from excessive regulations and bureaucracy,” commented Prime Minister Donald Tusk later.
Dziemianowicz-Bąk’s Letter to Donald Tusk
In January, journalists from Onet.pl, Kamil Dziubka and Andrzej Stankiewicz, reported in the “Stan Wyjątkowy” podcast that the family affairs minister from New Left, Agnieszka Dziemianowicz-Bąk, sent a letter to Prime Minister Donald Tusk in December 2025, urging acceleration of government work on the PIP reform.
“She justified that time is passing, that it’s a ‘milestone’ related to the implementation of the National Recovery Plan (KPO),” said Dziubka. “Apparently, in this letter, the minister had included a suggestion that the prime minister would be personally responsible for Poland losing tens of billions of zlotys from the KPO. I asked about this in the ministry and received assurance that there was nothing like that in the letter,” added the Onet.pl journalist.
Unofficial Reports of a Dispute
TVN24.pl also reported that Agnieszka Dziemianowicz-Bąk had sent a “reminder” to the Chancellery of the Prime Minister (KPRM) regarding the legislation. At the end of December, a heated argument was said to have occurred at a government meeting.
“From the ministers we spoke to, we heard that the prime minister turned to Dziemianowicz-Bąk and the head of the funds and regional policy ministry Katarzyna Pełczyńska-Nałęcz. He reportedly demanded explanations why something the government had not agreed to was included in the draft and ended up as a milestone,” the portal reported. The head of government allegedly accused the family affairs minister of trying to “smuggle her views into the bill.”
The Family Minister’s Letter to the Prime Minister
Gazeta.pl obtained the content of the letter that Agnieszka Dziemianowicz-Bąk sent to Donald Tusk on December 30 of the previous year. In it, the minister appealed to the head of government to consider the draft law before the Council of Ministers. She pointed out, among other things, that in August the project was accepted by the Team for Programming Government Work, in October by the Committee for Digitization, and at the beginning of December by the Standing Committee of the Council of Ministers.
She noted that on December 22, the project was referred to the Council of Ministers for consideration.
“Threat of Losing Funds”
“Failure to implement the reform carries the risk of the Republic of Poland losing approximately 11 billion zlotys from the National Recovery Plan (according to estimates by the Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Policy based on data from the Ministry of Funds and Regional Policy) – 8.3 billion zlotys for reform objective A71G and 2.8 billion zlotys for objective A72G. In light of the above, I turn to the Prime Minister with a polite request to consider the Project before the Council of Ministers,” Agnieszka Dziemianowicz-Bąk warned in her letter.
The document did not contain an explicit statement that not accepting the project would burden Donald Tusk with personal responsibility for losing KPO funds. However, the minister did include a clear warning that Poland could lose money if the government does not take concrete steps.
Further Developments of the Reform
At the beginning of February, the Standing Committee of the Council of Ministers adopted a modified version of the State Labour Inspectorate reform project. The Council of Ministers is set to consider the project. The new draft stipulates that a PIP inspector will have the authority to issue an “order” to an entrepreneur. If this is not implemented, the matter should be referred to a regional labour inspector. An appeal against the inspector’s decision can be made to court within 30 days.
