People's Deputy Pasichnyi: There are no preferences for any of the regions in the 2024 draft state budget

The Mykolaiv region did not receive any preferences in the draft state budget for 2025, which the Verkhovna Rada adopted in the first reading. Funding is mainly directed to the security and defense sector.

People's deputy, representative of the budget committee Oleksandr Pasichnyi (Servant of the people) told about this in the comment of NikVesti.

It should be noted that on October 31, the Verkhovna Rada approved the draft state budget for 2025 in the first reading, expenditures in it increased by 50 billion hryvnias. We turned to the parliamentarian to find out whether the state budget provides for preferences for the Mykolaiv region.

«There are no preferences for any region in the project. Due to other instruments (reserve fund or recovery fund), there may be changes in the course of 2025. All for defense,» said Oleksandr Pasichnyi.

The second reading of the state budget for 2025 is expected at the end of November. The head of the Verkhovna Rada, Roksolana Pidlasa, spoke about this earlier. However, the exact date has not yet been announced.

As a member of the specialized committee of the Council, Oleksandr Pasichnyi also spoke about the main provisions of the draft state budget for 2025:

1. Subsidies to local budgets
   For the next year, it is planned to increase subsidies to local budgets to 51.2 billion hryvnias, which is 17 billion hryvnias more than in 2024. These funds will be allocated quarterly, taking into account income from personal income tax, land tax, real estate tax and single tax.

2. Personal income tax (PIT)
   The Ministry of Finance proposes to reduce the share of personal income tax that goes to community budgets from 64% to 60%. However, according to Oleksandr Pasichnyi, the deputies suggested leaving an additional 4% in the communities and giving up subvention for tariff compensation for regional budgets.

3. Reverse grant
   The draft budget provides for the return of the reverse subsidy, which previously remained in local budgets. It is proposed to withdraw it from local budgets, and to provide a basic subsidy for regions with insufficient financial resources. This issue will still be discussed in the final version of the budget. Note that the reverse subsidy is money that local budgets transfer to the state budget if their revenues exceed a certain level. It works as an equalization mechanism: when certain communities collect more taxes than others, part of these funds are withdrawn and directed to the state budget to support less well-off regions.

4. Funds of the Road Fund
   All revenues of the Road Fund in the amount of 43.2 billion hryvnias are proposed to be directed to the general fund of the state budget to finance defense needs.

5. Humanitarian demining
   The budget provides at least 2 billion hryvnias for demining the territories of Ukraine.

6. Social benefits for victims of the Chernobyl disaster
   It is foreseen that the so-called «Chernobyl pension» will be paid only to those who lived in the exclusion zone from 1986 to 1993, which should reduce expenses by about 15 billion hryvnias.

7. Infrastructure and medical support
   According to Oleksandr Pasichnyi, the people's deputies also instructed the government to consider the possibility of allocating 4.8 billion hryvnias for the purchase of new passenger cars, as well as allocating funds for the provision of safe conditions in medical institutions and the implementation of projects in the field of health care.

The state budget project for 2025 will still be finalized. Adjustments and possible changes in funding are expected to be made before the second reading.

We will remind, recently at the conference «Mykolaiv — a city on the wave», the mayor of Mykolaiv, Oleksandr Sienkevych, stated that the city will not be able to develop without tax benefits from the state, because due to high business risks, Mykolaiv does not attract investors and is inferior to other regions of Ukraine.

Prior to that, the head of the Mykolaiv Oblast Vitalii Kim also spoke about the need for preferences for the Mykolaiv Oblast. At that time, it was noted that the Government would make changes to the mechanism for booking conscripted employees of enterprises and would consider amendments from the Mykolaiv RMA regarding preferences for front-line regions.

We should also note that Oleksandr Sienkevych recently supported the mayors of cities who appealed to Volodymyr Zelenskyy to protect Ukrainians from the rapid increase in tariffs, disruption of the heating season, and preservation of reversionary funds in local budgets in 2025. He said that Mykolaiv does not have a reverse subsidy, but in the 2025 State Budget project, they are trying to withdraw 4% of personal income tax from citizens, which is 153 million hryvnias, and the single tax is 63 million hryvnias.