Democratic Party: "We will cut wasteful and illegal projects without compromise and revive the livelihood budget"

Park Hong-geun "Wasteful Tax-funded Projects, Illegal Enforcement Decree Projects Must Be Cut"
Woo Won-sik "Next Year's Budget Increase Limited to 1%, Financial Drought"

[Asia Economy Reporters Naju-seok and Park Joon-yi] The Democratic Party of Korea has set the principle of "uncompromising cuts" to wasteful projects and increases in budgets related to public welfare in the review of next year's budget.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

On the 26th, Park Hong-geun, the floor leader of the Democratic Party, said at the Budget and Accounts Special Committee workshop held at the National Assembly, "The first priority in budget review should be the fight to block ultra-rich tax cuts that go against global trends and are unsuitable for national finances," adding, "This government's ultra-rich tax cuts amount to 60 trillion won over five years, with 6.4 trillion won in revenue cuts in next year's budget alone."

Park emphasized, "We must make uncompromising cuts to representative projects that waste taxpayers' money," and said, "Budgets related to the relocation of the Presidential Office including the construction of a new guesthouse, the operation of the Prosecutor's Personnel Information Management Unit through illegal enforcement ordinances, projects that reduced six major crimes to four but still require reporting through enforcement ordinances, and budgets that unlawfully establish the Police Bureau by reversing history through enforcement ordinances must be thoroughly blocked and cut."

He then spoke about increasing budgets cut from public welfare. He pointed out, "Seniors and youth are the most vulnerable groups when the economy is difficult, yet the related budgets to increase their jobs have been drastically cut."

Park added, "This year's budget reduced to zero the 17.5 trillion won that was increased from the 15 trillion won national subsidies and 15 trillion won local government issuance funds during last year's Budget Committee negotiations. It's as if they just let small businesses survive or die on their own," and said, "Budgets that support small business owners and those that guarantee citizens' housing rights, such as public housing, must be significantly increased."

He urged, "With a majority in the assembly, we should not oppose unconditionally but produce budget review results that firmly support what is done well."

Woo Won-sik, a Democratic Party member and chair of the National Assembly Budget and Accounts Special Committee, also explained, "Due to tax cuts for the wealthy, tax revenue has decreased by at least 60 trillion won over five years, and next year's national tax revenue is expected to increase by only 1%. Considering the costs for the elderly population that grows by 5% annually, this is the worst fiscal drought in history." He criticized, "The cost of such fiscal tightening is directly sacrificing budgets for public welfare and future preparedness," pointing out that "the entire budget for local love gift certificate issuance support, public senior job and social activity support projects, renewable energy distribution projects such as solar power, and public rental housing construction and purchase budgets were also sacrificed as representative expenditure restructuring projects."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.