The Knesset Finance Committee today voted to make an across-the-board cut in ministries' budgets of NIS 907 million to finance supplementary spending on defense and swine flu vaccines. The vote was nine in favor to six against.
During the discussion Ministry of Finance Budget Director Udi Nissan asked both government and opposition MKs to postpone the vote, but Finance Committee chairman MK Moshe Gafni (United Torah Judaism) refused.
A NIS 2 billion cut in other ministries' budgets is needed to finance the supplementary spending on defense and swine flu vaccines, but the Finance Committee approved less than half the amount. The balance will have to come from coalition agreements, the budget reserve, and ministries' budget underperformance.
Gafni was able to cancel a NIS 314 million cut in the budget for yeshiva students. The ministries of education, public security, foreign affairs, and industry, trade and labor are among those that will have to absorb budget cuts. The cuts included reductions in budgets for the offices of ministers without portfolios and deputy ministers.
Gafni said, "This cut goes against our conscious and it does not look good only two months after passing the two-year budget. I'm glad that we were able to limit the damage and the cut."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on November 10, 2009
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