site.btaUPDATED Budget Draft for 2025 Sets Spending at 40% of GDP, Deficit Below 3%, Says PM Zhelyazkov

Spending up to 40% of GDP and maintaining a budget deficit of no more than 3% are the main parameters of the 2025 budget draft, Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov said at a briefing on Tuesday.

Zhelyazkov made the statement followed a meeting of the Joint Governance Council at the National Assembly, where the ruling coalition discussed the State budget for the current year. No tax increases are planned, Zhelyazkov added.

In recent days, there has been significant debate over the closing of the 2024 financial year, Zhelyazkov noted. 

He said the issue concerns commitments and invoiced expenditures that have not yet been settled. The discussion was crucial in determining the expenditure base for the draft budget and the revenue framework under the consolidated fiscal program.

Zhelyazkov explained that the government must finalize and submit the 2025 budget draft, including the budgets for public social security and the National Health Insurance Fund, in compliance with the Public Finance Act’s requirements—keeping spending within 40% of GDP and the deficit below 3%.

"This will be the proposal of the Council of Ministers," Zhelyazkov said.

"We discussed the individual measures in both expenditure and revenue, how reslistic feasable and relevant they are, so that the investment programme in the central government and in the municipalities continues to be implemented, as well as other important matters such as renovation, but the budget should allow, after a vote in the National Assembly, the government to have the basis to submit a request for a convergence report on the fulfillment of the criteria for membership in the eurozone, with the clear understanding that at the moment the ratio of the Bulgarian lev to the euro is fixed, it is 1.95583, it is not subject to change and this is confirmed by an act of the National Assembly," said the Prime Minister.

Zhelyazkov expressed hope for support for the draft budget with a regard to Bulgaria meeting the criteria for membership in the eurozone. He pointed out that Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria should clearly express whether they will support a budget that would allow Bulgaria to submit a request for an extraordinary convergence report.

When asked where expenses will be cut, the Prime Minister said that specific measures both in terms of expenses and revenues are being discussed. "We will not propose exotic measures like those that were proposed in the withdrawn draft budget for 2025 by the previous cabinet," Zhelyazkov said. "We have clearly stated that we will not change the tax and social security burden and will submit a draft budget with the current Value Added Tax Act," he added.