Mixed messages

Before she officially had moved into her new office, the new Finance Minister was already provoking controversy.

First, she blindsided her own party with plans to increase the budget deficit, despite assurances from Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz that the deficit would be no larger than zł.30 billion a year during the life of his government.

"If the Prime Minister insists, the deficit will be zł.30 billion but I think it is more important to have more research and development spending. In my opinion zł.1 billion doesn't matter," she told the Financial Times (FT).

She also used the FT's pages to launch a broadside against supermarket chain Tesco. "Hypermarkets like Tesco are no investment. I mean they are not vital for economic growth," she said.

With Tesco being the largest UK investor in Poland, employing some 20,000 people in a country with a 17-percent unemployment rate, Lubińska's comments met with a cool reaction. Despite her liberal past, Lubińska's statements had a populist ring to them.

Her colleagues rushed to her defense, with Law and Justice authorities blaming Lubińska's controversial statements on a lack of public-relations skills and inexperience with the media.