"Whoever makes the correct criticism that the country has had low growth, at the same time does not have the capacity to present a strategy for development that does not pass almost exclusively through tax reductions, as if it were the silver bullet that it will allow our companies to produce, sell and earn money”, said Pedro Nuno Santos.

For the head of Infrastructure, thinking that lowering taxes is the only solution to “save companies” is a “small vision of economic policy” that “delayed the country for many years”.

Pedro Nuno Santos started from Portugal's need to renew the train fleet to exemplify his vision of how the economy and the country can develop.

“Our country has always been very good at importing, we buy very well. We do not give it an opportunity to do it here”, he said, explaining the strategy that the Government is following in the case of the purchase of train carriages.

“What are we doing? The specifications [for the purchase of new carriages] are being worked out so that, not violating European legislation, it guarantees that whoever wants to supply trains to Portugal has to make them here, has to assemble them here, has to incorporate national production in the manufacture of these trains”, he said.

"Not only because we want entrepreneurs to participate in those trains in particular, but because we want the national industry in Portugal to gain skills in a sector that is growing, so that tomorrow, when there are supply tenders, we have our companies there to present work that has already been done”, he stressed.

“And this is how we can develop an economy, this is how we can develop a country”, concluded the Minister of Infrastructure and Housing.