Expenses in public institutions reduced by 20 pc

Prime-minister Emil Boc announced, yesterday, that in the previous day's government meeting it had been decided that public institutions and authorities should reduce their expenses in goods and services by 20 per cent in the third and fourth quarter. State institutions will reduce, by this ratio, acquisitions and expenses in fuel, internal travels, phone bills, fittings and furniture. The only field in which expenses remain constant is that of healthcare for the staff of these institutions. Moreover, the fuel quota allotted to one high-ranking official within various agencies, ministries, authorities and state companies, as well as within county and local councils, is sliced by half, Boc announced.

At the same time, the Government approved an emergency ordinance which stipulates granting a loan of EUR 360 M to local authorities to pay remaining debts in goods, services, works commissioned to traders and debts to the state. The term for reimbursement will be of 5 years, with one year term of grace, at a 6.25 per cent interest rate. "By this decision, we wish, in fact, to break a vicious circle, in which the state has debts to companies, companies are indebted to the state budget, and blockages arise in the economy," the head of the Executive explained.

The prime-minister gave assurances that, in the case of state secretaries, advisors or the boards of companies in which the state is the minority shareholder, there will no longer be any wages above the legal level, but that they will be set at a level to be soon agreed upon by the Executive. Boc also stated that representatives of the state in the boards of companies where the state is the minority shareholder will be forced to donate their pay to a solidarity fund, on pain of being suspended.

Nine O'Clock