The parliament passed changes to the health premium. There were no surprises

Health and Public Finance Committees on Tuesday, the full Parliament on Wednesday. The first stage of the changes (the government's second draft, which introduces larger, more comprehensive changes to the health premium starting in 2026, has been sent back to work in an extraordinary subcommittee) is moving through parliament like a storm. On Wednesday, 248 deputies voted in favor of the bill, but only six were against it. Almost all of the voting Law and Justice deputies abstained (which does not happen often in this term). The group of non-voting deputies was also large - and in it Izabela Leszczyna in particular drew attention. Admittedly, the head of the Health Ministry had said earlier that she could hardly be expected to support changes leading to a depletion of the NFZ budget (while stressing that the depletion would be compensated), but on the other hand - it was, after all, the Health Ministry that submitted an auto-amendment to the draft, which assumed only the elimination of the premium on the sale of fixed assets, introducing a reduction in the basis for calculating the premium for companies with the lowest revenues.

Only one Law and Justice MP, Janusz Cieszynski, voted in favor of the bill. 171 members of his club abstained, and 18 did not vote. PiS announced that it would not vote against bills that would provide at least a small amount of relief to entrepreneurs. In the KO club, meanwhile, only one deputy voted against it (Jaroslaw Walesa). 147 supported the bill, while nine did not vote. The PSL-TD, Polska2050-TD and Konfederacja voted almost entirely in favor (individuals from these clubs did not vote). Against was the entire five-member Together circle, whose deputies requested several times that the bill be rejected.