00:03Hello and welcome to The Cube, Euronews' fact-checking show.
00:07Which EU economy is performing the best?
00:10That's the question some are asking
00:12after Portugal's Prime Minister, Luiz Montenegro,
00:15said it was his country that was leading the charge.
00:18Montenegro made the comments
00:20while speaking to the Assembly of the Republic,
00:22Portugal's parliament,
00:23while MPs were debating a motion of no confidence
00:27in the government put forward by the far-right Chega Party.
00:30The Prime Minister told MPs,
00:32who ultimately rejected the motion,
00:34that Portugal had the best economic performance
00:37and the best rate of employment growth in Europe.
00:40But is this true?
00:42To find out, we can take a look at the most recent Eurostat figures,
00:45which say that the EU's GDP was up by 0.7%
00:49in the second quarter of 2026, compared to the previous quarter.
00:53Ireland was the main driver of this,
00:55with far and away the highest jump in GDP at plus 10.2%.
01:00Slovenia and Lithuania came in second and third place
01:03at 1.8% and 1.7% growth respectively.
01:07Portugal came in joint seventh place with Cyprus at 0.8%.
01:12So it's fair to say it's among the best of the 27 member states,
01:16but it's not the best according to Eurostat data.
01:19When it comes to employment,
01:20the same Eurostat dataset shows that employment had gone up by 0.1%
01:25in both the Eurozone and the EU in the second quarter of 2026.
01:30And in this case, Montenegro would be correct.
01:33When broken down by member state,
01:35Portugal comes in top at 1% employment growth in the second quarter of 2026.
01:40It's followed by the Czech Republic and Malta in joint second place at 0.9% growth.
01:46Several countries saw a decrease in employment though,
01:50notably Finland and Greece.
01:53But I'll be quiet.
01:53macam in the next quarter of 2026.
01:56Dziękuje za oglądanie.
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