The National Council approved the state budget for 2023

Last update: 22.12.2022 13:00

The members of the National Council of the Slovak Republic have approved today the state budget bill for the next year along with the general government budget for the next three years. The budget was approved at a time when Slovakia is facing an extreme impact of multiple crises occurring at the same time. Its main objective is to avert the imminent increase in energy poverty as well as possible economic damage, while also aiming to strengthen resources in the health sector, and other sectors as well. The “People's Aid Budget” provides for one-off compensatory funding to help the population, businesses, public institutions and municipalities to cope with the enormous increase in energy prices.

The budget includes permanent measures that exceptionally increase salaries in the public administration as well as various benefits for citizens to make up for the negative consequences of increased inflation. It provides for a historically unparalleled rise in the salaries of teachers (by up to 23.2% in a year) and those of other civil servants (17.7%) and in pensions (11.8% indexation); a family package for families with children (a transfer to families exceeding 1.1 billion euros); and a significant increase in healthcare workers’ salaries amounting to 500 million euros.

One-off allocations made in the budget for 2023 for compensatory measures related to the energy crisis and high energy prices total 3.5 billion euros. And it is also a budget of recovery and repayable investments: it provides for significant investment incentives in the amount of 2.3 billion euros to be funded under the Recovery and Resilience Plan and total investments at the level of 7 billion euros. The implementation of reforms and investments under the Recovery and Resilience Plan is to advance Slovakia towards the materialisation of the vision of a modern state that provides high-quality public services to its citizens. At the same time, however, the budget also considers economic responsibility and includes public spending limits.

“We have approved the law of the year and I can say that this is a real gift to the people, the citizens of the Slovak Republic because this budget is historically unprecedented in terms of aid to citizens,” said Prime Minister of the Slovak Republic Eduard Heger.

“Today, we have pushed through a responsible budget that lends a helping hand to those who would be particularly affected by the energy crisis. It is only because the budget has been approved that our electricity bills will not rise. The budget has also definitively sealed the fact that we have turned Slovakia into the most pro-family state in the whole European Union,” Minister of Finance Igor Matovič emphasised.

“The budget was approved by the constitutional majority. The Parliament has confirmed that Slovakia is not on any ‘Greek path’. I have repeatedly emphasised that it is in the essential interest of Slovakia to adopt the budget and not to enter the provisional budget stage, which was fulfilled today. I want to thank the whole team of employees and experts at the Ministry of Finance for their efforts,” added State Secretary of the Ministry of Finance Marcel Klimek.

The People’s Aid Budget is a necessary trade-off between the need to provide extra funding to deal with the enormous rise in prices and the soundness of public finances. Taking into account, among other things, the substantial increase in energy prices and the necessity of the Government’s appropriate response in order to provide a stabilising anchor and security to citizens and businesses, the budget target for 2023 is set at a level of approximately 6.5% of GDP. The balance adjusted for temporary effects (one-off and temporary measures and the cyclical component of the balance) thus corresponds to 3.1% of GDP in the 2023 budget.

Press Department
Ministry of Finance of the Slovak Republic