Finance Committee Chairman MK Avraham Hirschson (Likud)
complied with a request last week by MK Meshulam Nahari
(Shas) to investigate whether the Treasury follows a practice
of approving the transfer of two-thirds of surplus funds only
in budgeting for chareidi institutions while approving 100
percent of surplus funds in other cases.
The query follows the Finance Committee's recent approval of
NIS 36 million for chareidi cultural institutions instead of
the NIS 54 million available from 2002 in this category. The
Finance Committee claimed that the Treasury assumed a stance
in principle of refusing to transfer more than two-thirds of
surplus funding to any entities.
Yet last week the Finance Committee received several requests
to transfer NIS 30 million in funding to various ministries,
all of which derive from surplus funds and all of which were
approved in full.
When Nahari uncovered this inconsistency he asked to have the
transfers delayed immediately, in accordance with standard
practice, and voiced his grievances to Hirschson over alleged
budget discrimination by the Treasury against the chareidi
sector.
Hirschson said he would act to rectify this discrimination if
the allegations prove correct.
