“What would justify raising tolls by 10% next January? Nothing,” he stated.

António Costa was speaking in Covilhã, at the XX Federative Congress of PS/Castelo Branco.

In his speech, the socialist leader and prime minister pointed to inflation as one of the questions to be answered and assumed that there are sectors in which the increase is reflected in the final cost, but not in the case of tolls.

António Costa stressed that in the specific case “there are no increases in energy costs”, nor any increase in the production factor that would justify the motorway concessionaires increasing the cost of tolls by 10%.

Costa promised that he would take measures, but did not specify which ones.

“There are no increases in energy costs, there is no increase in the production factor that justifies motorway concessionaires increasing the cost of tolls by 10%, which is why we will intervene. So that they do not take advantage of this circumstance to have an unjustified increase that would greatly penalize the functioning of the economy and the Portuguese as a whole”, he stressed.

Motorway concessionaires had until the 15th of November to communicate to the Government their price proposals for 2023, after which the State had 30 days to comment.