Bulgaria’s Parliament is to approve the second reading of the 2008 Budget Bill on December 19 2007.

The second-reading debate started the day before, but the eight-hour sitting was not enough for members of the Parliament (MP) to vote on all the clauses.

Budget 2008 envisions income of 18.3 billion leva and spending of 17 billion leva, including funds to be transferred to municipalities and the yearly payment to the European Union budget. The budget surplus expected is 1.3 billion leva or three per cent of GDP.

The opposition demanded that a bigger revenue be provided for in the budget and accused the ruling parties of deliberately decreasing the expected revenue to achieve a bigger budget surplus at the end of 2008.

Tax income is expected to reach 16.7 billion leva, and non-tax income will be 1.55 billion leva. VAT income alone will be 8.2 billion leva, and a separate 2.1 billion leva is expected from corporate tax.

The reserve for emergency spending is 489 million leva. Nearly 110 million leva of this sum is allocated for structural reforms, 80 million for prevention and coping with natural disasters, and 300 million for fiscal stability.

MPs approved 55 million leva expenses for Parliament and 6.4 billion leva for ministries and state institutions. The income of ministries and institutions is expected to total nearly a billion leva.

The Presidency will receive a 6.8 million leva subsidy, Bulgarian National Radio 47 million leva and Bulgarian National Television, 66.7 million leva.

According to Budget 2008, state debt should not exceed 11.8 billion leva in 2008. The maximum amount of the fiscal reserve could be 6.8 billion leva.

At the December 18 parliamentary sitting, the Budget 2008 clauses were approved only with the votes of the ruling parties. The opposition rejected the budget structure, philosophy and calculations. “As a response, the ruling majority did not approve any of the numerous proposals made by opposition MPs,” mediapool.bg said.