Council of Ministers approved draft Budget 2022

The framework for Budget 2022 has been adopted by the Council of Ministers, Prime Minister Kiril Petkov announced at a briefing after the extraordinary meeting of the Council of Ministers today, January 31. The meeting was held online, as the Minister of Finance Asen Vassilev is ill with Covid-19 and is under quarantine.

"We have accepted the proposal for the Budget for 2022. I am glad to tell you that this is a budget of the growth. Government investments will be 5.8% of GDP. The deficit with the Covid measures will be 4.1%. This year we will definitely invest from 2.9 to 5.8%. We will have free-of-charge kindergartens, starting in April, we will invest so that there are pensioners below the poverty line. At least for the next 6 months we will have measures to deal with Covid and high electricity prices," said Petkov.

Electricity bills, which will be received in February, will include compensation for December and January. A working group is also being set up to discuss aid to municipalities.

"Until we have a situation in which one lamp on one side of the street costs BGN 1,587 and another lamp on the other side of the street costs BGN 5,755, until we clear these public procurements, we cannot say that municipalities do not have money for street lighting, " Petkov stressed (referring to the recent revelations about different costs of marinating street lights).

"Wrong decisions" are the main reason for the change of management of Bulgaria’s public gas supplier "Bulgargaz"

The dismissal of Bulgargaz's directors is due to the fact that Bulgarian Energy Holding and the Ministry of Energy believe that they have not performed their tasks well.

"An investigation is currently underway and we are largely sure that some of the decisions they have made result in high gas prices and the 30 per cent increase proposed to the energy regulator EWRC," he said.

According to him, the opposition is trying to shift responsibility.

"I expect accusations in the coming days. When you see the figures and the real results, the price of gas rises by 30% on January 1 and the government is transferred responsibility for weeks - this is on the verge of sabotage. We voted for an additional compensation of 61 million for the water sector," Petkov commented.

The opposite thesis of Bulgargaz is that we have given up on the cheaper supplier, but this will be seen in court if such a phase is reached, the Prime Minister was firm.

There are a series of events in Bulgargaz's resource management and a clear reluctance to follow the policy of the energy regulator, the energy minister added.

The prices proposed by Bulgargaz and approved by the Energy and Water Regulatory Commission are publicly available and published on Bulgargaz's website. You can see the changes of the prices on the international markets and decide if all the resources went to the benefit of the public. Is every consumer obliged to pay for incompetence, said Nikolov.

The Minister of Energy explained that the amount of compensation for gas prices is high, currently covering 20% ​​of the costs for household consumers.

"Bulgaria has one of the lowest natural gas prices. The benefits for the citizens are shared with the business. We are planning measures with business partners. We will try to do it quickly, but we are also looking to make it transparent," Nikolov said.

According to the Prime Minister, the state is not an active employer, so special measures are envisaged to increase efficiency in the public sector.

"Deputy Prime Minister Vassilev's comment was clear. When we compare how productive our workers are - 50% of the European average. Our workers are more productive than they are paid. We all need to work to increase productivity and efficiency," he said.

Petkov also commented that the country is prioritizing good neighbourliness in relation to North Macedonia.

***

The Bulgarian Energy Holding (BEH) on Friday said it replaced the management of public natural gas supplier Bulgargaz.

The decision to dismiss the entire board of directors of the company came in the last hours of the working day. There were no motives in the protocol that was disseminated to the media.

However, it is known that the Minister of Energy Alexander Nikolov has repeatedly asked why Bulgaria does not receive the entire agreed amount of Azeri gas, which is currently cheaper than Russian.

Bulgargaz's response so far has been the reason it is unable to receive the full amount of gas supplies it has agreed with Azerbaijan is that the construction of the Greece-Bulgaria gas link, connecting Komotini in Greece with Stara Zagora in Bulgaria, has still not been completed.

However, the Minister of Energy insisted that this was not an obstacle and that the entire amount of natural gas could reach Bulgaria through an alternative route.

Back in time, Nikolov also implied that Bulgargaz sold cheap gas from Chiren to Romania instead of using it in the country. It is also known that the Bulgarian Energy Holding has carried out an inspection in Bulgargaz, a few days ago an inspection of the company was launched by SANS, but it is not said whether there were specific violations that could have lead to this change.

The main motive that comes to the fore is "wrong or ill-advised decisions" by Bulgargaz, which have led to higher prices, the prime minister said today.

"Discharged from office, but not from responsibility." This is stated in the protocol of the Bulgarian Energy Holding for the five former members of Bulgargaz.

images by BGNES

Чуйте последните новини, където и да сте!
Последвайте ни във Facebook и Instagram
Следете и канала на БНТ в YouTube
Вече може да ни гледате и в TikTok
Намерете ни в Google News