Country:

Hungary

Subject:

The Parliamentary schedule of the procedure of passing the law on Hungarian state budget

Introduction:

Despite all uncertainties going with minority governance the chance that the Parliament dissolves itself is very little in the near future. In this situation, one of the most exciting issues of the autumn political session will be the question whether the Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány led Socialist minority government is able to pass the 2009 state budget in the Parliament. Therefore it is worth taking a closer look at the major steps of the procedure of passing the state budget.

Analysis:

The deadline of submitting the budget is scheduled at 30th September by the law. The State Audit Office (SAO) can prejudge it until no later than 17th October. (It has been a practice in Hungarian politics that the possible reviews of the SAO are disregarded by the Government without any consequences, however, the analysis of the SAO is published in details in the Hungarian media.) Between 20-22 October, all the committees of the Parliament have to take a stand whether the budget proposal is eligible for the general debate. According to the Rules of Procedure of the Parliament, it is the Budgetary Committee that collects the opinions from all committees and forms a final opinion for the Plenary Session.

Though this standpoint of the Committee is not binding, has no legal consequences and it is merely an indicator, it will be the first serious signal from which the party attitudes can be derived. The Liberal's basic political attitude can be measured in the Budgetary Committee first which will be of key importance regarding the final vote of the Budget Law. The next politically important date is 31st October. This is the time of the Plenary Session with the leading speeches also indicating the intentions of the political parties. The closing of the general debate means the final deadline for handing in amendment proposals.

Then, the committees have to take positions on the amendment proposals. (The experiences show that the committees were willing to support amendments which were not accepted by the Government. This means that occasionally MPs from the Government side were ready to vote for more funds in case the claims were coming from fields controlled by them or their own constituency. These amendments were usually turned down by the Government side MPs later at the Plenary Session keeping in mind the indications of the Government and the Faction obligations.)

The detailed debate in the Parliament should be launched on 12th November. This debate is characterized by never-ending talks of MPs in order to show their electors or the representatives of their professional fields how ambitious they are in fundraising for them. After all these do we arrive at the first really important date, 25th November, when the Plenary Session, having voted on the amendment proposals, sets out the main figures of the state budget which means that the way to redistribute between headings (one heading refers to one sector of the total budget) is closed. So far the government discipline could guarantee financial discipline at the voting but now there is no government majority.

Thus, it may well be that the MPs will ruin the proposal of the Ministry of Finance regarding both amendment proposals and major sector sums of the budget. (If an amendment proposal receives minimum one third of the votes in any committee it can go to the Plenary Session regardless to the fact that it was not supported by the majority of the committee members. It can cause a problem for the Government if, considering the current political situation, all the amendment proposals shall be voted on the Plenary.)

Upon the 25th November votes, MPs can hand in so called second round amendment proposals. These ones can only initiate modifications within one chapter thereby loosing their political relevance and getting more professional importance. After closing the second detailed debate (2nd December), committees go forth with discussing new proposals that have to be voted by 9th December. After all these do we arrive to the point where the Parliament has to vote on the acceptance of the Budget Law on the 15th December according to the normal schedule.

Additionally, together with the discussion of the Budget Law there is the discussion of the laws on next year's taxes, obviously influencing the previous one. The Government can hand in the tax laws until 19 September. The general debate is expected for 7-8th October where the general attitudes of the parties can be seen. Amendment proposals to the tax laws will only be discussed in the Budgetary Committee no later than 21-22 October when the detailed debate is to come. Then the Parliament is voting on the proposals on 3rd November and is making the final vote on 10th November.

This situation is projecting that in this uncertain political situation the general debate of the Budget Law is carried out without knowing exactly what tax incomes the Government can count on next year. Connected to the legislation procedure it is worth mentioning that even though the procedure itself is regulated by a law and the Rules of Procedure (of the Parliament), not keeping the timetable draws no sanctions. That is, either the Government or the political parties can initiate not keeping the timetable for political reasons.

If the Liberals do not vote either in favor of the law taxes on 10th November or the major chapter sums of the Budget Law on 25th November or the final version of the same on 15th December, finally, the most important question will be whether the Socialists are able to 'buy' some votes, as they are in need of only 5 extra votes from the opposition and the independents, considering 100% MP participation.

Summary:

Passing the tax laws and the Budget Law has a well-defined procedure described precisely in various laws. These laws give no guarantee in case of such prevailing political uncertainties. This is even more significant if the Liberals play the role of an opposition party. If there is no preliminary political agreement between the Liberals and Socialists, political uncertainty and instability around the state budget will survive.