REUTERS
The draft law also provides for keeping unused subventions from the national budget on the accounts of the local budgets as of the end of the year.
The Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine's parliament, has passed bill No. 9369 on amendments to the national budget of Ukraine for 2018, which provide for an increase by UAH 10.778 billion, or US$385.2 million, in expenditures on pensions.
The document was backed in the first reading and as a whole by 242 MPs with the required minimum of 226 votes, an UNIAN correspondent reported on December 6.
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The draft law stipulates that national budget expenditures will grow by UAH 10.778 billion in pension payments, by UAH 227.4 million ($8.1 million) in surcharges for work in the exclusion zone around the Chornobyl nuclear power plant, and by UAH 27.6 million ($986,419) in payments for the modernization of the Vernadsky Research Base in Antarctica.
The increase in expenses is to be compensated by lowering expenses for a number of other programs, in particular, social assistance worth UAH 7.2 billion ($257.3 million) due to savings under this item, as well as expenses on public administration reform totaling UAH 1.208 billion ($43.2 million).
The draft law also provides for keeping unused subventions from the national budget for social and economic development of certain territories and health care in rural communities on the local budgets' accounts as of the end of the year.
As UNIAN reported earlier, Ukraine's national budget in January-November 2018 received UAH 843.133 billion ($30.1 billion) in revenue, which was 1.9% below the planned figure and 16.4% up year-over-year, according to Ukraine's State Treasury Service.
The national budget of Ukraine for 2018 sets a goal of UAH 917.9 billion ($32.8 billion) in revenue and UAH 991.7 billion ($35.4 billion) in expenditures. The budget deficit is capped at UAH 80.6 billion ($2.9 billion), or 2.4% of GDP.