Civic Platform MP, and self-styled maverick politician Janusz Palikot thinks that ex-presidents should get a pension rise.

The MP thinks that retired presidents, such as Aleksander Kwasniewski and Lech Walesa should get the same money in their pension as incumbent president, Lech Kaczynski gets in his pay packet.

Currently a presidential pension equals half of the presidential salary. Palikot wants both acting and former heads of state to receive the same amount of money - 8,000 zloty (2,000 euro) a month.

“The raise will not cost the state budget much and it will enable retired presidents to live in a dignified way, instead of having to work on the side,” says Palikot, referring to Lech Walesa, who earned extra money by giving speeches at the euro-sceptic Libertas party’s conferences last year.

Palikot says that Speaker of the Sejm Bronislaw Komorowski has assured him that the lower house will also be looking at another pet project of his - forcing the president to reveal the results of annual health checks.

The proposed legislation is bound to fail, however. The opposition Law and Justice party and some Civic Platform MPs oppose Palikot’s ideas, claiming that the initiative is a next stage of a “private war” between a controversial MP Janusz Palikot and the acting president Lech Kaczynski. (pg/mg)