The president of the Reformist Movement (MR), Georges-Louis Bouchez, declared immigration, tax cuts, and reduced public spending as key priorities during the party’s New Year tour launch on Sunday in La Louvière.
Several hundred MR activists and senior party members, including Walloon Minister-President Adrien Dolimont and guest of honour Roland Duchâtelet, attended the event.
In a 30-minute speech, Bouchez emphasised that immigration is the MR’s top priority. He called for stricter migration policies, including sending foreign prisoners serving sentences in Belgium back to their home countries and tightening the criteria for Belgian nationality.
The MR leader also pushed for tax cuts and curbing public expenditure. He specifically proposed taxing mutual insurance organisations on the same basis as other companies.
Bouchez suggested merging municipalities as a way to reduce public spending, citing potential savings of €160 million annually if all municipalities had at least 15,000 inhabitants. His remarks prompted applause from the audience.
He also applauded ongoing reforms at various levels of governance, specifically changes in unemployment policies, which he described as “a major reform whose full impacts are yet to be realised.”
Closing his speech, Bouchez addressed the recent exclusion of the MR from government formation negotiations in Brussels. “Brussels needs us now more than ever. We will continue to work by submitting all proposals from our negotiation notes to the Brussels Parliament,” he concluded.
