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Sunday, 1 March 2009
Officials ordered to cut costs or keep them unchanged
The ruling Communist Party and the State Council jointly issued a notice yesterday requiring all party organs and government bodies to cut unnecessary and wasteful spending in what has been officially labelled as the “most difficult year”.
Officials ordered to cut costs or keep them unchanged
Al Guo in Beijing 28 February 2009
The ruling Communist Party and the State Council jointly issued a notice yesterday requiring all party organs and government bodies to cut unnecessary and wasteful spending in what has been officially labelled as the “most difficult year”.
Separating yesterday’s notice from many similar ones in the past were eight detailed rules that required spending in specific areas to be reduced or at least maintained at last year’s levels.
It required spending on overseas trips to be cut by 20 per cent, using the average figure of the past three years as its basis, and fuel consumption of public service vehicles to be reduced by 15 per cent.
Spending on government receptions, officials’ meals and public ceremonies should also be cut or maintained at last year’s level, the notice said.
“Those who violate these rules - major leaders and officials directly responsible for the violations - will be seriously punished according to party disciplinary regulations or state laws,” it warned.
Chinese Academy of Social Sciences professor Xu Youyu said the detailed guideline was an improvement on mostly empty slogans in previous notices, though it was hard to say how big a role it could play.
“I can only say that having the policy is better than not having it, but it’s hard to evaluate its effectiveness now, for regional officials always know how to play with whatever rules the central government announces,” Professor Xu said.
The government has never disclosed how much it spends a year on receptions, meals and travel, but it has been estimated at close to 400 billion yuan (HK$454 billion). Xinhua has run a story estimating that such spending reached 370 billion yuan in 2004.
A property official in Nanjing, Jiangsu, was disciplined last year after a website exposed he had smoked cigarettes that cost 1,500 yuan a box and wore a watch worth tens of thousands of yuan. Huge and often wasteful government spending was also underscored this year after a group of Guangdong officials was found to be using public funds for lavish overseas trips.
Professor Mao Shoulong, of Renmin University, said the new notice, even though more specific, could not stop wasteful spending such as in the Nanjing and Guangdong cases.
“The central government still has no idea where regional governments spend their money. The key here is not to cap, but to give the public the kind of transparency on public spending which could stop many officials from squandering taxpayers’ money,” he said.
The notice came just a few days before the National People’s Congress and its advisory body, the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, meet in Beijing.
Professor Xu said the timing of the notice was suspicious. “To me, it looks more like a strategy to stop many delegates from raising the issue in both meetings,” he said.
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Officials ordered to cut costs or keep them unchanged
Al Guo in Beijing
28 February 2009
The ruling Communist Party and the State Council jointly issued a notice yesterday requiring all party organs and government bodies to cut unnecessary and wasteful spending in what has been officially labelled as the “most difficult year”.
Separating yesterday’s notice from many similar ones in the past were eight detailed rules that required spending in specific areas to be reduced or at least maintained at last year’s levels.
It required spending on overseas trips to be cut by 20 per cent, using the average figure of the past three years as its basis, and fuel consumption of public service vehicles to be reduced by 15 per cent.
Spending on government receptions, officials’ meals and public ceremonies should also be cut or maintained at last year’s level, the notice said.
“Those who violate these rules - major leaders and officials directly responsible for the violations - will be seriously punished according to party disciplinary regulations or state laws,” it warned.
Chinese Academy of Social Sciences professor Xu Youyu said the detailed guideline was an improvement on mostly empty slogans in previous notices, though it was hard to say how big a role it could play.
“I can only say that having the policy is better than not having it, but it’s hard to evaluate its effectiveness now, for regional officials always know how to play with whatever rules the central government announces,” Professor Xu said.
The government has never disclosed how much it spends a year on receptions, meals and travel, but it has been estimated at close to 400 billion yuan (HK$454 billion). Xinhua has run a story estimating that such spending reached 370 billion yuan in 2004.
A property official in Nanjing, Jiangsu, was disciplined last year after a website exposed he had smoked cigarettes that cost 1,500 yuan a box and wore a watch worth tens of thousands of yuan. Huge and often wasteful government spending was also underscored this year after a group of Guangdong officials was found to be using public funds for lavish overseas trips.
Professor Mao Shoulong, of Renmin University, said the new notice, even though more specific, could not stop wasteful spending such as in the Nanjing and Guangdong cases.
“The central government still has no idea where regional governments spend their money. The key here is not to cap, but to give the public the kind of transparency on public spending which could stop many officials from squandering taxpayers’ money,” he said.
The notice came just a few days before the National People’s Congress and its advisory body, the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, meet in Beijing.
Professor Xu said the timing of the notice was suspicious. “To me, it looks more like a strategy to stop many delegates from raising the issue in both meetings,” he said.
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