Walter Ruck, president of the Vienna Chamber of Commerce, did not send holiday greetings to the federal chancellor, who is currently in Greece, and the finance minister: after waiting months for the finance ministry’s decision, Ruck sent a letter on the payment of corona aid will financially support all lawsuits by Viennese entrepreneurs against the ban, with five million euros reserved for these upcoming trials.
Walter Ruck, president of the Chamber of Commerce, tells Standard: “Since the Ministry of Finance has not yet come up with a solution, the executive committee of the Vienna Chamber of Commerce has decided to provide a fund of five million euros. The purpose of this fund The idea is to enable model lawsuits and trials to be run on aid for those Viennese companies that rely on the Republic, but are now left alone with their problems indefinitely.
With this decision of the Vienna Chamber of Commerce, a huge avalanche of procedures in the Ministry of Finance can be triggered – 8,600 cases are known to Rook, possibly 4,000 entrepreneurs will take legal action. Rook in the Standard interview: “I recently heard about 8,600 open cases, of which 4,000 may be affected by these issues. They have submitted their promising applications based on the applicable legal framework, and Republic now tells them to ‘please wait’, as it is not known whether this was correct. This kind of behavior is not good for a business place. Legal certainty is one of the greatest commodities. Companies should be able to rely on promises and laws. Anything else is harmful.”
And representatives of Viennese entrepreneurs are quite annoyed that the Ministry of Finance has still not been able to find a solution: “Our Viennese companies are disproportionately affected by these alleged EU adversaries. On the one hand, there are suspicions that the affiliated companies may have received too much money, and on the other, the application deadline for the last tranche of corona aid was too long because it went beyond the temporary EU aid framework. Although the problem has been resolved, it will have a serious impact on large companies. Auditors were no longer able to certify outstanding corona aid listed as claims in the balance sheet. Because the Finance Ministry has said that you do not know whether everything happened according to the law or not. This has an impact on operating results and, consequently, on creditworthiness etc.”
In September, ie in a few days, the federal government wants to present a plan on how it wants to respond to the open Corona demands. Regarding the version that nothing should be paid, Rook says: “It certainly would not be beneficial for the commercial space. Even ignoring legal certainty is extremely detrimental to location.