The rebalancing of the state budget for this year will be on Thursday at the government session, and in parliament next week, said Prime Minister Andrej Plenković on Tuesday in a statement after the coalition meeting.
The budget is increasing to 29.3 billion euros, and among the main reasons are funds needed for earthquake recovery and aid packages for citizens, as well as salaries and pensions, said Plenković. He added that the rebalancing should be in parliamentary procedure during the next week.
Regarding price movements after the freezing of prices for a certain number of products in retail, he responded that the move with the maximum price limit for 30 products contributed to those products becoming cheaper, but as he said, there is also a trend of price reductions for the ‘overall range of products in a series of retail chains’.
He believes that the decline in inflation that began in September compared to August will continue.
He said he had not seen the request from small traders HOK to limit margins, not prices. He added that the government would consider it and that it has good relations with the Croatian Chamber of Trades, which he said is ‘delighted’ with all government packages of measures.
When asked why he allows ‘a man under investigation’ (Frane Barbarić) to manage HEP, he replied that it is ‘because there is a process, and we also have a process of financial consolidation of HEP in the time of the greatest energy crisis’, and these are, he added,’things that will be resolved later’.
