Romanian prime minister Ilie Bolojan and minister of development Cseke Attila delivered on July 18 an update on the planned local administration reforms, which, besides the state companies reforms, should be drafted by the end of the month. The draft, as outlined by the two officials, is still in an early stage, does not include the measures requested by the Social Democratic Party (PSD), and the procedure envisaged for enactment in Parliament is still to be decided.
The two top government officials outlined specific measures at a very detailed level, at the cost of the bigger picture that remains blurred in terms of the size of the package or specific procedures involved by the concrete implementation. For instance, minister Cseke said failure to pay the fines charged to car drivers would result in the suspension of the driving license, but he was not able to clarify whether this breaches other principles, including constitutional principles.
Other measures involving cutting wages or positions depend on legal procedures that may be challenged in court; therefore, their implementation remains uncertain.
The procedure employed for enacting the reforms to be announced by the end of the month (local administration and public companies/institutions) had not been decided yet, PM Bolojan admitted. The Social Democrats, which are increasingly questioning the PM’s alleged authoritarianism in defining and enforcing reforms, argue for a normal procedure involving debates for each measure and a vote in Parliament (as opposed to the accelerated procedure, not involving a vote on specific measures, employed for the first package of reforms including the VAT rate hike).
Furthermore, PSD leaders have insisted on measures not outlined by PM Bolojan so far: more corporate taxes and regulating (levying taxes) on crypto trade. The prime minister promised to consider all the Social Democrats’ proposals – but similar promises in the past were followed by a very limited number of amendments being incorporated in the first package of reforms – which created irritation among PSD.
Finally, it is important to note that the local administration reform is only one of the two packages of reforms announced by PM Bolojan one week earlier: the other package, coordinated by deputy PM Dragos Anastasiu regarding the state companies and key state institutions, still remains to be detailed.
About this, PM Bolojan has reportedly announced main media representatives in an informal meeting during last week about this package including: downsizing (or eliminating) the various boards in state companies along with capping the related benefits of board members, streamlining the tax collection authority ANAF; and a mild reform of the special pensions (which might pose legal issues even under this planned mild form). Reforming the energy and financial market regulatory bodies (ANRE and ASF) would be tackled at a later moment, since they operate based on specific legislation that should be amended.
The measures outlined by PM Bolojan on July 18, in the area of local administration, are defined along three main directions: increasing efficiency and responsibility (mainly by cutting the costs); strengthening the administrative capacity; and developing public policies based on decentralisation, simplification and digitalisation principles.
Examples of specific measures are setting the maximum number of employees in the specific local administration unit (county or lower level) based on quantitative parameters (such as population or type of services provided); downsizing the number of Local Police employees based on the local administrative unit’s population and avoiding doubling activities with the National Police; and setting maximum wage charts for all local administrative units that depend on the disbursements from the central government budget.
Another important measure is the disbursement of funds from the central government, depending on key performance indicators such as the rate of tax collection. This later measure is, in fact, included in the existing legislation, but it has been constantly deferred, PM Bolojan explained.
iulian@romania-insider.com
(Photo source: Gov.ro)
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