Budget outlays EUR 800m over current limit planned this year

Ljubljana – The government expects that this year’s budget expenditure will be EUR 800 million higher than planned in the current budget documents. It says that the situation regarding Covid-19 had deteriorated significantly since the budgeting process was completed.

The ceiling for general government expenditure is set in a budgeting decree passed by the National Assembly in November along with the budgets for this year and 2022.

Under draft changes to the decree published on the government website today, the government now plans to ask parliament to raise the ceiling in order to mitigate the negative impact of Covid-19.

After the budget was passed, additional stimulus measures were passed in the total amount of EUR 1.5 billion, outlays which could not have been planned at the time. The treasury allows for the possibility that additional stimulus measures may be adopted.

As a result, the government plans to raise maximum budget expenditure by EUR 800 million to EUR 14.32 billion, which would raise the budget deficit from 5.7% to 8.6% of GDP.

General government expenditure, a broader category which also includes the health and pension funds, will additionally increase outlays by an estimated EUR 70 million due to higher pensions, the result being the general government deficit rising from 6.6% of GDP to 8.6% of GDP.

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