On Jarosław Gowin and leadership in Polish society

The meeting we organised with Jarosław Gowin last week will stay with me for some time - he made a deep impression on me and on several other UK-born Poles and British ex-pats. Poland currently has three strong, respected Anglophiles in the key 'power' ministries - UK born and LSE-educated Jacek Rostowski (finance), Oxford-educated Radek Sikorski (foreign affairs) and, since last autumn, former Cambridge scholarship student Jarosław Gowin (justice). [Compare this the PiS coalition line-up of Gilowska-Fotyga-Ziobro].

Anyway, Mr Gowin was speaking about his reforms, with a focus on reforming the court system. Indeed, the entire Polish legal system is dreadfully slow and essentially self-serving. Like many other parts of this country's bureaucracy, it is a self-perpetuating caste extracting its rent from the wealth-generating part of the economy. For the last 23 years nothing much has changed - indeed, the caste has become more entrenched and harder to reform.

Notaries? Why does the nation's economy need them at all? The UK doesn't (other than for international transactions). Why do you need someone to witness you signing your signature (which exists in your biometrically verified passport)? Commercial courts? Why do you need a judge to decide whether or not you can set up a limited liability partnership? Who's the other party in this case? KRS - what a waste of space. Compare the Polish system with the efficiency of Companies House (which employs 1,030 people - how many work in the Polish commercial courts system registering companies? Over a thousand in Warsaw alone, according to one lawyer). And then compare the UK Land Registry with its Polish court-based equivalent. A court, with a judge, to carry out a simple administrative function of noting change of ownership of real estate?

For too long Poland's politics have lacked leadership - to tackle the przyzwolenie społeczne (social acceptance) of a bloated rent-taking caste helping itself to the fruits of the free enterprise and offering precious little in return. Many university professors fall into this category - clinging onto their tenureships at the expense of real innovation and still teaching by rote.

Changing this? Most politicians I've met in Poland are in themselves nice-enough people; but too many are simply free-riders, using their God-given charm, drive and oratorical skills to schmooze their way to an easy-life parliamentary career. Ryszard Kalisz, for example. Nice enough guy - as a youth, he joined the Socialist Union of Polish Students; a member of the Polish United Workers' Party from 1978 until its dissolution in 1990. Drives posh cars. Still a leftie, committed to redistributing wealth. "Vote for me, and I'll give you the rich man's money" is his subliminal message. This type of politician has no interest at all to bring about the real change that Poland needs if it is to be more competitive internationally. The vested interests must be taken on and beaten.

For the last 10 years, I've sat through scores of Polish politicians' speeches. Smooth-talking self-serving hypocrites or well-meaning incompetents, mostly. A handful stand out - and thankfully - these are the guys who run the place - Messrs Rostowski, Sikorski, Gowin (as mentioned above) - Michał Boni in Internal Affairs, Elżbieta Bienkowska at Regional Development.

Listening to Jarosław Gowin was a revelation. Here's a man who's challenging my deepest assumptions - about a life in balance, avoiding stress, healthy diet, good books and movies - no, he is saying. Not the time to take it easy - not just yet. There is a job to be done. A task in hand. To get our nation working properly. To kick out the jams. The rent-taking restricted professions, determining who can get into their gang so as to extract a livelihood by providing second-rate services for laughably high prices, must be challenged.

[I must say though, I do have some sympathy with taxi drivers. These guys, paying astronomical prices for petrol, offer an excellent service compared to Poland's notaries, bailiffs, estate agents or customs agents.]

Leadership is not about a wódz or duce or fuhrer that will lead One Nation to Greatness. It is about individual people standing up for what is right in society - demonstrating leadership through politeness, sobriety, hard work, courteous driving - contributing, rather than demanding entitlement.

After our meeting with Mr Gowin, many - quite cynical, heard-it-all-before, seasoned Poland hands, were of the opinion that here is the Conservative's Conservative - a market liberal, but a social, Pope-quoting, conservative - who could be that One Nation leader, unifying that bulk of Poland that might once have been POPiS had it not been for the splitter element of the nationalist-statist tendency. I've never heard it before after such a meeting - but four people I spoke to after the event talked of Mr Gowin in terms of a future premier. Another view of the same meeting here.

(Take a look at public-sector rent-taking in Brazil, here.)

This time last year:
Death of a Polish pilot

This time two years ago:
Doesn't anyone want to recycle my rubbish?

This time three years ago:
End of the school year

This time four years ago:
Midsummer scenes, Jeziorki