Danca: Gov't adopts OUG on fiscal-budget measures

Prime Minister's Chancellery head Ionel Danca said on Monday that the Government adopted the emergency ordinance (OUG) on some fiscal-budget measures, providing locking in the benefits for dignitaries and the suspension of the provisions in the administrative code regarding the special pensions for locally elected until 1 January 2021.

"The Government had to adopt in the first meeting an emergency ordinance allowing the coming into force of some measures needed for balancing the budget and encouraging the economy, which it assumed responsibility for before Parliament. (...) We are talking about locking in the benefits for dignitaries after the increase in the minimum wage and through the OUG adopted today the benefit level is locked in at the level of December 2019. We are talking about suspending the enforcement of the administrative code on special pensions for locally elected until 1 January 2021. Moreover, the level of the bonuses for the public employees was set at the level of December 2019 for the year 2020," Danca said at the Victoria Governmental Palace.

He added that the normative act doesn't include the provision banning double-dipping because a decision from the Constitutional Court is expected in this matter.

"The normative act includes provisions eliminating the obligation of additional capital increase for pension funds administrators, as well as provisions related to the administration commissions of pension funds, which, through their reduction, leave more money in the fund of the participants to pension Pillar 2. The 2 percent fee on turnover for energy companies was eliminated, an absolute urgent and necessary measure, so that the energy market of Romania may benefit from a confidence and stability climate. Also approved was the cessation of posting employees from the private sector to the public sector as of the OUG coming into force," Danca said.

He added that under this normative act, the Development and Investment Fund is to be dissolved when the ongoing contracts conclude for which the amounts granted are diminished at the value of the amounts received until the moment of this OUG coming into force for the works conducted and received according to the law.

Danca also mentioned that the fee on banking assets was eliminated, and the fine point was locked in at the 145 lei level, thus having eliminated the correlation with the minimum wage level