BERLIN (Reuters) – There will be no blanket spending cuts in the 2024 budget, German Finance Minister Christian Lindner said on Wednesday.
“We want to present plans for the budget soon,” Lindner said before answering questions in the Bundestag’s budget committee.
Germany’s three-party government – comprising Lindner’s Free Democrats, the Social Democrats and the Greens – had been due to vote on the budget on June 21 after Lindner postponed the presentation of the final draft in March.
Lindner has since said that the June 21 deadline was no longer feasible.
The budget needs to be consolidated significantly after massive increases in spending during the coronavirus pandemic and due to higher energy costs as a result of the Ukraine war.
At the same time, several ministries have registered projects that require financing.
Lindner has already said that even more savings must be made and new spending should only come from existing funds.
According to government sources, there is currently a gap of around 20 billion euros ($22.02 billion) in the plans for 2024.
Germany’s finance ministry updated its tax estimates this month. It expects 148.7 billion euros less in tax revenues for the German state in the 2023-2027 period compared with previous forecasts published in the autumn of 2022.
“We must adjust to the new budgetary realities,” Lindner said in the presentation of the tax estimates.
($1 = 0.9084 euros)
(Reporting by Maria Martinez; editing by Matthias Williams, Friederike Heine and Christina Fincher)
