Budget financing of political parties

1. Budget financing of political parties September 2006

2. Budget financing of political parties’ regular work • What is “regular work”? • Do assets have determined intention? • Are assets used for work of parliamentary groups? • Is the user determined by presenter of the list or by member of parliament? • What is the purpose of budget financing? • Criteria for distribution are determined in which way?

3. Budget financing of regular work of political parties in Serbia • “Regular work” – all except election campaign • There is no obligation that assets should be used for the work of parliamentary groups • Combined solution for determining carrier of distribution • Lowering the dependence of private financers/securing assets for functioning of political parties • Considerable enlargement of assets from 2004 and change of criteria (share in the budget of RS instead of number of average salary)

4. Budget financing of regular work of political parties

5. Legal regulation – article 4 • Assets from public resources, that are secured for financing of regular work of political party whose candidates are elected for parliament, or for board members, are determined at the level of 0,15% of the budget of republic of Serbia (reduced for transfers at other levels of authority and organizations of obligatory social security), 0,1% of the budget of territorial autonomy units (reduced for transfers from other levels of authority and to other levels of authority) odnosno 0,1% of the budget of local municipality units (reduced for transfers from other levels of authority). • 30% of assets, from paragraph 1. of this article, is distributed in equal amounts to political parties that have representatives in parliament and board members,and rest of the assets (70%) proportionally to the number of board and parliament places. • Ministry that has authority over finances, that is authority organ of the municipality direction, that is municipality organ, transfers proportional part of the assets from paragraph 1. of this article to political parties each month, till tenth in month for previous month.

6. Legal regulation – combined interpretation that is implemented at the republic level • Assets are distributed to parties whose members entered the Parliament (at their own list, at the coalition list or on else’s list) • After closing of some party, new calculation and redistribution are done (example DC and NDS) • Assets are allocated independently of real state in the parliament – in the case that some parliament representatives leave their and transfer to some non parliamentary party, former party continues to receive assets “for them” (example of transfer to PSS, creating SDPO) • When the parliament representative transfers to other “elected” parliamentary party, the assets that that party getsare increasing (example of transferring from GSS to DS) • Independent representatives in parliament and parties that weren’t parliamentary when parliament was formed don’t get budget assets (example SDPO, PSS etc)

7. Real state: number of parliament representatives and share in financing of parties from budget

8. Gained mandates and share in financing of carriers of election lists

9. Financing of parties from budget – parties that support Government and opposition

10. Recommendations • Explicitly determine the goals of budget financing of political parties • To specific by Law to what purposes this assets could be used, that is to determine closer the concept of “regular work of political parties” • To determine explicitly by Law carrier of the rights to budget assets (matter of parties that enter parliament at coalition or else’s list) • To oblige parties to use part of their assets to improve quality of parliamentary group’s work • To determine clearer criteria for distribution of budget assets, according to goals of financing • Lower the share of assets that are in equal amount awarded to parties and increase the share of assets that is awarded in accordance with their representation in parliament • To secure adequate control of spending assets in accordance with purpose (State Audit Institution and others) • To secure that public should be adequately familiarized with the information of how the parties used assets awarded from budget • To regulate by Law matter of financing independent parliament members’ activities