PRU turns attention to budget issues

  • 2010-08-18
  • From wire reports

TALLINN - Chairman of PRU, Mart Laar, stated at the party’s congress during the weekend that two major priorities for Estonia in the near future will be to move towards a greater state budget balance, and to draft a plan to deal with the debt burden of some local governments, reports Aripaev Online. Laar explained that there is still no thorough analysis on the economic crisis and in order to avoid the mistakes caused by Estonia itself, in the future the country needs to increase the sustainability of the budgetary balance. He added that real steps must be taken to ensure this balance.

“The first test facing Estonia will be a question of possible supplementary budgets,” said the chairman of the Pro Patria and Res Publica Union. “According to current outlooks, Estonia will by the end of the year collect more revenue in the budget than had initially been planned,” he added.
Laar asserted that PRU is of the position that this extra money should not be spent, but rather should be directed to improving the budgetary balance. “PRU wants Estonia to be able to live without supplementary budgets in the future,” said Laar, adding that in drafting the 2011 budget, the state should also aspire towards a budget without a deficit.

In his speech, the PRU chairman also drew attention to the situation in the local governments that have ignored the limitations imposed by the government and have assumed obligations that they can no longer meet. He said that in increasing the local municipalities’ debt burden irresponsibly, the municipalities are not only risking the welfare of local residents, but of the entire state. At the same time, the PRU does not support punishing local governments for the mistakes made by previous leaders. The municipalities ought to be granted an opportunity to decrease their debt burden.

The PRU held its extraordinary party congress during the party’s summer retreat in Elva during the weekend.