Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Public Administration and Justice Tibor Navracsics has said that estimates show that – as a proportion of the population – more people have access to the social recreational resort system in Hungary than anywhere else in Europe.
At a press conference in Budapest on Tuesday he said that ‘We are at the forefront of Europe and in many ways we are ahead of Europe, showing by example that a government can be socially committed in a way that is not only shown in words, but also in the action it takes to implement its ideas.’
The programme spokesperson said that this year the Erzsébet Programme is helping about 135,000 people gain access to recreational resort facilities. Anna Nagy said that this year 72,000 children will have recreational resort and camping opportunities. Last year there were hardly a dozen camps, but this year more than fifty kinds of camp have been announced, said the spokesperson. She stressed that every child living in Hungary can apply to attend an Erzsébet camp. Distinctions are made with regard to the cost of going to camp: if a family has a per capita income exceeding HUF 98,000, then the camp fee is HUF 10,000; if not, then it is one or two thousand forints. She added that some calls for applications to organise camps are still open, and a further sixteen camps can be arranged, with a deadline for applications of 20 May. Ms. Nagy said that most applicants have come from eastern Hungary. Erzsébet camps start on 17 June, and the last phase ends on 24 August. Children’s camps will continuously take place in many locations and several phases over this ten-week period.
Zoltán Guller, ministerial commissioner for governmental coordination of the Erzsébet Programme’s implementation, has said that Erzsébet Vouchers have over two million users, about forty thousand employers order them every month and there are more than forty thousand outlets which accept them as payment. Eighty per cent of these are retail chain outlets and twenty per cent are small shops. Two-thirds of all outlets accepting the vouchers are Hungarian-owned, he said. He said that last year the distributor of Erzsébet Vouchers registered a turnover of more than HUF 86 billion, and HUF 130 billion is expected this year.
According to press material distributed at the press conference, this year the framework budget for calls for applications issued by the Hungarian National Resorts Foundation amounted to HUF 2.5 billion. Of this, HUF 1.1 billion related to social recreational applications, and HUF 1.4 billion was for general and themed camps and spring and autumn excursions primarily aimed at children and young people. The foundation has increased the budget for this year by HUF 498 million, using the surplus from last year’s resort vouchers.
This year fifty-six calls for applications have been announced for Erzsébet Camps. Due to the sixteen remaining calls for applications, the number of children participating in the programme could increase by ten thousand.
(Ministry of Public Administration and Justice)
