site.btaDefence Ministry Refuses to Support Draft 2015 National Budget

Defence Ministry Refuses
to Support Draft 2015 National
Budget


Sofia, December 1 (BTA) - The Defence Ministry said on Monday it
refused to support a draft 2015 national budget which was
nevertheless approved by the Council of Ministers earlier in the
day.

The national budget bill and an updated national budget forecast
for 2015-2017 imply that the Defence Ministry budget will be
reduced by 66,423,000 leva compared with a forecast submitted to
the Finance Ministry. The Defence Ministry's personnel
expenditures will be reduced by 77 million leva in 2015 compared
with 2014. The Defence Ministry complained that the decrease of
its budget is the largest decrease of a ministerial budget in
absolute terms and will not be reversed throughout the 2015-2017
period.

Therefore, the Defence Ministry refused to support the draft of
the 2015 national budget, arguing that the scheme will make it
impossible to perform tasks relevant to troops' combat
readiness, the protection of Bulgaria's sovereignty and
territorial integrity, the training of troops in accordance with
the capability goals agreed with NATO, and the training of
forces for overseas missions and operations led by the UN, NATO
and the EU.

The Defence Ministry's personnel expenditures, as proposed by
the Finance Ministry, imply that the military will have to
reduce their personnel by 4,000. This means that the
29,000-strong Bulgarian Armed Forces will have to shrink, which
runs counter to an agreement within Bulgaria's ruling coalition
to preserve the numeric strength of the Armed Forces, boost the
motivation of servicepersons and enhance personnel selection,
the press release said.

It drew attention to the fact that any personnel changes in the
Defence Ministry system should be consistent with the Armed
Forces Structure Review, based on an analysis of the security
environment, and should be coordinated with the other allies in
NATO.

National legislation has it that when a serviceperson is made
redundant, they are entitled to severance pay, which makes it
impossible to reduce personnel expenditures. Furthermore, the
budget projections do not take into account compensatory
payments required under three separate laws. Therefore, any
personnel cuts in the system will increase the costs rather than
reduce them, the Defence Ministry noted. PK/VE

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