The parliamentary committee clarified the provisions on “donations” and budget planning

On Wednesday, the Parliamentary Public Finance Committee issued a positive opinion on 7 amendments to the draft amendment to the Public Finance Act. They were submitted by KO MP Zofia Czernow, arguing that they were intended to help interpret the act.

On Wednesday, the Public Finance Committee considered 7 amendments to the government bill amending the Public Finance Act and certain other acts, submitted during the second reading by Zofia Czernow. All applications received a positive opinion from the committee.

“Most of them are of a clarifying and detailed nature, so that there are no problems with the interpretation of the act during its implementation,” the MP explained.

The amendments included a proposal to replace the term earmarked donation, which is included in one of the provisions, with the term donation by recommendation, indicating that it is a type of donation provided for in Art. 893 of the Civil Code. This provision regulates the institution of command in a donation agreement, allowing the donor to impose on the recipient an obligation to perform a specific action or omission. A command means that the recipient must fulfill an additional obligation.

Earlier, the Public Finance Committee adopted legislative and clarifying amendments to the project, which resulted mainly from suggestions from Parliament legislators.

The aim of the government's draft amendment to the Public Finance Act is to complete the Reform of the Budget System, which is one of the milestones included in the National Reconstruction Plan.

The reform was divided into two parts. The first – already implemented – covers the medium-term budgetary framework and changes to spending reviews. The second part concerns changes in the budget classification, the budget management system and the introduction of public investment evaluation criteria, and its implementation is to be implemented thanks to the draft amendment being worked on by the Sejm.

According to the justification for the project, the changes included in the areas of budget classification and state budget management are to translate into improved effectiveness and efficiency of spending public funds. A new system of public expenditure groups is to be introduced; are to be divided according to their economic nature. Thus, the existing expenditure groups included in the Budget Act will be replaced by new ones. Similar changes were introduced in relation to the budgets of local government units (LGUs).

The package of planned changes in the management of the state budget includes, among others: regulations that are intended to improve processes related to the development of draft financial plans and income and expenditure schedules.

As part of the draft regulations, a new deadline for developing and submitting to administrators parts of the budget draft financial plans for the next financial year is proposed – the current date of December 1 is to be changed to November 25. The deadline for submitting information on the amounts of income and expenses by administrators to subordinate units is also to be shortened – from 10 business days to 7 calendar days, which is intended to make the process of implementing and executing the state budget more flexible.

The Ministry of Finance also wants additional information regarding part of the state budget with the division of competences of individual ministers to be presented in an annex to the draft budget act. Moreover, it is to be mandatory to include the financial plans and funds of Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego in the justification to the budget act. This is to ensure parliamentary and social control over the collection and expenditure of funds in these funds. The Ministry also wants the report on the implementation of these financial plans to be included in the justification for the implementation of the Budget Act submitted to the Sejm each year.

Changes in the field of public investments include, among others: assessing public investments when their estimated total cost is at least PLN 10 million. The Ministry of Finance reported that they constitute approximately 52%. value of investments financed in a given year from the state budget. The assessment of such an investment is to be published when its estimated total cost exceeds PLN 500 million. Information about implemented public investments is also to be published when their cost estimate is at least PLN 100 million.

The proposed regulations apply to public investments financed or co-financed in a total amount of at least 50%: from state budget expenditure, from expenditure of state earmarked funds, from expenditure of funds established, entrusted or transferred to BGK; using securities received free of charge. These regulations will not apply to investments, among others: co-financed from European funds.

The rules regarding local government budgets are also to change. The justification stated that their purpose was, among others, to: improving the process of implementing multi-year projects. According to the project, local government units will be able to make changes to the multi-annual financial forecast regarding the limits of liabilities or expenditure amounts for all multi-annual projects (and not only those related to the implementation of EU projects, as before). The scope of changes was conditional on the local government budget result not deteriorating for each year covered by the forecast. (PAP)

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