EXCLUSIVE Public hiring suspended, salary freezez, car and furniture purchases prohibited, team buildings put on hold, pension-salary cumulation disappears. Draft EGO for budget savings – DOCUMENT

A draft emergency ordinance in the inter-ministerial circuit details the main measures to be taken in ministries, agencies, and municipalities to cover the budget gap. G4Media has obtained the draft, which is subject to change. Importantly, some of the savings measures target both budgetary institutions and state-owned companies.

 

• Why the budget cuts: state budget revenues are 4.7 billion lei lower than planned in the first quarter alone, and the projected gap for the whole year is 20 billion lei. Prime Minister Ciucă has asked Finance Minister Adrian Cîciu for a plan for budget savings.
• Read the FULL DOCUMENT here – draft EGO budget savings (Romanian version)

 

Staff spending freezes in all state institutions at 2022 levels.

 

The heads of public authorities and institutions, irrespective of the method of financing and subordination, are obliged to take the necessary measures to ensure that staff expenditure in 2023 does not exceed the level of payments in 2022, excluding amounts relating to enforceable titles for the granting of salary rights to budget sector staff, increased by 5%.

 

Operating expenditure of state institutions and companies is frozen at the 2022 level.

 

The heads of public authorities and institutions, irrespective of the way they are financed and subordinated, are obliged to take the necessary measures to ensure that expenditure on goods and services in 2023 does not exceed the budgetary provisions for 2022 (including state companies).

 

Public institutions, including state companies, are prohibited from purchasing, leasing or renting cars, furniture and office equipment.

 

Employment in central and local public institutions and state-owned companies is prohibited:

 

In 2023, as from the date of entry into force of this Emergency Ordinance, the filling of vacant or temporarily vacant posts in:

(a) public institutions and authorities as defined in Article 2 para. (a) public institutions and public authorities, as defined in Article 2(1)(30) of Law No 500/2002 on Public Finance, as subsequently amended and supplemented;

1. b) local public institutions, as defined in Article 2 (2) (a) and (b) of the Law on Public Finances, as amended and supplemented from time to time. (1) item 39 of Law No 273/2006 on local public finance, as subsequently amended and supplemented.

 

It is forbidden to cumulate pension and state salary, except for education and health:

 

Starting from the date of entry into force of this Emergency Ordinance, the beneficiaries of the pension entitlement belonging both to the public pension system and to the systems not integrated into the public system, who receive salary income or, as the case may be, income assimilated to salary, according to the law, obtained from the exercise of an activity on the basis of an individual employment contract, service report or on the basis of the act of appointment, according to the law, within the central and local public authorities and institutions, regardless of the method of financing and subordination, economic operators, provided for in Art. 1 of Government Ordinance No. 26/2013 on the strengthening of financial discipline at the level of certain economic operators in which the State or administrative-territorial units are the sole or majority shareholders or directly or indirectly hold a majority stake, as amended and supplemented subsequently, may not cumulate the pension with the income thus earned.

– The provisions of this Article shall not apply to persons occupying teaching posts in educational establishments and specialist medical posts in health establishments.

– The provisions of this Article shall also apply accordingly to recipients of service and military pensions established by special laws.

 

Additional conditions for state employees who get bonuses for having a PhD:

 

Paragraph (1) of Article 14 of the Framework Law no.153/2017 on the salaries of staff paid from public funds, with subsequent amendments and additions, is amended to read as follows:

„(1) Staff holding the scientific title of doctor shall receive a monthly allowance for the scientific title of doctor in the amount of 50% of the level of the minimum gross basic salary per country guaranteed in payment, if they work in the field for which they hold the title and if they have provided in their job description a set of objective and quantifiable tasks that allow monthly verification of how their work is additionally valued. The salary amount of this allowance shall not be taken into account in determining the limit of the allowances, compensations, bonuses, premiums and allowances provided for in Article 25.”

 

Institutions lose unspent funds in the first quarter:

 

In 2023, for the Chief Authorising Officers whose budgets are approved as annexes to the annual budget law, for expenditure financed from the state budget, the budget appropriations approved and not used in the first quarter shall be canceled at the time of the first budget amendment.

 

Team buildings courses are prohibited:

 

In the year 2023, starting from the date of entry into force of this Emergency Ordinance, public authorities and institutions, regardless of the mode of financing and subordination, shall not organize training courses. Including state firms

 

A person may be a member of a maximum of two boards of directors:

 

In 2023, employees of public authorities and institutions, irrespective of the mode of subordination and financing, may simultaneously hold a maximum of two mandates as members of the board of directors and/or members of the supervisory board in public enterprises whose headquarters are located in Romania.

 

The establishment of the Agency for the Quality and Marketing of Agri-Food Products is postponed until 2024

Translated