"Local financial expenditure operation of the current situation of the investigation and analysis of the subject group" in August 2008 to March 2009, in the Beijing Municipal People's Congress Standing Committee of the Finance and Economy Committee with the assistance of the Beijing Municipal People's Congress as a sample of the two levels of Beijing municipal (county) government, visited the Municipal Bureau of Finance, the Municipal Audit Bureau, the Dongcheng, Xicheng, Haidian, Pinggu District People's Congress and part of the district and county people's congresses and county people's congresses. District and county people's Congress and some districts and counties of the financial, audit, supervision departments, and more than ten administrative institutions of finance and accounting staff interviews and surveys, combined with the study of the relevant literature in foreign provinces and cities, summed up the four major persistent problems of the current government's financial expenditures.
Obstacles 1: excessive official spending has become a collective activity
Survey shows that the public money to eat and drink, travel at public expense, the construction of high-grade buildings and houses, such as huge official spending has become the government's a habitual collective activity.
Signs of a vested interest in the system to restrain resistance or disguised resistance. Such as overseas study tours in various administrative institutions basically evolved into a welfare treatment, when the financial department asked to cut the funding for overseas study tours, it met a certain degree of resistance. The greatest resistance has been to the reform of public transportation, which has even been halted after more financial inputs were made. Although the specific reform programs vary from place to place, they share the same characteristic, that is, the target of the reform is the policy makers and implementers who preside over the reform.
The reason for the failure of the reform is that the reform policy has given too much consideration to how to compensate for the loss of vested interests, while ignoring the existing system and the results of the "reform" to the public **** finance and taxpayers to the loss and harm.
The second symptom is a lack of restraint on the power sector. Usually, those who have the ability to build high-grade buildings are the government, finance, taxation, courts and other power departments. For example, the office building project of a local finance bureau has been formally approved by four or five government departments, including the local development and reform commission and the planning bureau. The local discipline inspection and supervision department analyzed, "because the Finance Bureau is a power unit", the relevant departments have "face, did not adhere to the principle of the problem", thus forming the Finance Bureau how to report how to approve the situation. The local government departments are still so constrained, it can be imagined that the party and government "first and second hand" of the constraints is even more powerless.
Signature three, due to the existing system of loopholes and unreasonable. Administrative units often appear "in order to spend money, and spend money" situation. For example, a department of the research office of the scientific research project extension of one year, but the use of project funds did not extend the period. Then, according to the system requirements, must be the original deadline to spend all the money suddenly, can not spend all the arrangements for domestic and foreign visits at public expense. Similar cases are common, some units of the collective public money to eat and drink the cause, often also to be to spend the money.
Sign four, the general lack of public **** financial concept. Friends party grabbed the bill, the last one stood out and said: "I'll pay, the unit can reimbursement." So we gladly accepted, and even reached *** knowledge: can spend public money will not spend personal money, "others can not take advantage of the cheap, the public cheap do not take white do not take". When the public **** departments, brother units, up and down the hierarchy, each other with public funds hospitality has become a kind of fashion; when the holidays before reminding subordinates, "do not forget to show that" has become a norm; when the higher authorities to the subordinate units, tube food and accommodation tube tour has become a habit; when the same system of units in different provinces between the courtesy, the Mutual communication, excessive official consumption has formed a collective activity, coupled with the "law is not responsible for the masses" and "herd mentality", the problem of official consumption is difficult to manage.
Obstacles two: the end of the year surprise spending, more and more intense
In the fourth quarter of each year, the major shopping malls, bookstores, "group purchasing card" in the "hot" state, come to buy the budget units in an endless stream. This is just "the end of the year to spend money" one of the forms of expression. The disadvantages of "end of the year spending spree" are obvious, it is not conducive to the rational use of financial funds, resulting in waste, affecting the realization of the expected results of financial expenditure. In recent years, "end of the year spending spree" has shown a growing trend. Although, different regions and different budget units "end of the year surprise spending" situation is not the same, in the financial funds flow of the grass-roots level of local government, this kind of problem is not too obvious. But all are eager to spend the money before the end of the year, "budget unit" is not the same initial intention: worried about the balance of money if the "zero", the amount of financial allocations for the next year may be affected.
The result of this operation, mainly the preparation and implementation of the budget of several situations caused by:
The first situation, the budget unit of the budget is not real. In the project budgeting process, the budget unit hit too much surplus, the financial sums allocated down a moment and can not be arranged, so that the end of the year to spend money suddenly. This kind of misrepresentation of the budget is easy to analyze the psychology, either for fear of future uncertainties, unpredictable, must leave room for error; is to make up for the lack of public funds; or simply by the interests of the tendency to move, more financial funds, don't want for nothing.
The second situation, the budget unit of slow implementation of the previous period. Budget implementation "before the loose after the tight" is a relatively common phenomenon. Or plan to do more coarse, the early work is not tight; or worry about the money is not enough, do not dare to spend the early stage; there are some objective factors, such as the government procurement time is longer so that the financial expenditure of the time to move; part of the project because of the relevant procedures for a moment not to be done to complete the work, so that the start of the time to move back and thus cause the financial expenditure to move back; due to the inspection and acceptance of the engineering project cycle, or some of the repair projects (such as student dormitories) can only start the holidays and other special problems of their own. The backward shift is due to the inspection and acceptance cycle of projects, or the fact that some renovation projects (such as student dormitories of institutions) can only be carried out during the vacation period.
Thirdly, some of the financial funds were disbursed late and in uncertain amounts. As far as the budget unit is concerned, the second half of the year from the financial sector "to" how much money or the financial sector can add how much money is an unknown, and sometimes part of the financial funds allocated down very late (such as November and February before in place), resulting in the end of the year to spend money on a sudden and inevitable move.
Three: the distribution of light efficiency, financial expenditure inefficiency
In recent years, with the increase in fiscal revenue year by year, the establishment of the goal of building a harmonious society, the government to the people's livelihood construction of the financial investment is a fast-growing trend, while at the same time, the inefficiency of financial expenditure of the government at all levels of the problem came to the fore, mainly manifested in the allocation of slow, idle funds, idle equipment, duplicate Construction, duplication of funding, financial investment is not efficient or ineffective and so on.
From the level of financial capital allocation efficiency, decision-making mistakes are the main reason for the inefficiency of financial expenditure. "Image projects", "performance projects", there is no lack of labor and injury to the people and money, in the look of the project is not useful, a large number of financial resources allocation projects because of the lack of scientific evidence and legal procedures, resulting in duplication of construction, duplication of funding, such as in 2006, the Beijing Audit Bureau of the sampling of special subsidies for seven districts and counties, such as Changping For example, in 2006, the Beijing Audit Bureau conducted a random inspection of the management and use of special grants in Changping and seven other districts and counties, and found that six districts and counties had 31 projects with multiple or duplicate declarations, and that the grants involved amounted to 370 million yuan. In the area of capital investment, because of fragmentation, many budgetary units, in addition to receiving financial resources from their own governments, also receive secondary allocations from higher-level industry authorities. Coupled with the lack of unified planning and coordination, so that there are often "roads are constantly being ripped open", on April 14, 2006 to December 22, Beijing Yongding Road section has been four pipeline units, divided into four times digging over. Failure of decision-making not only can not realize the optimal allocation of social resources and public **** resources, but also cause huge losses and waste.
From the level of efficiency in the use of financial resources, idle funds, idle equipment, poor quality of the project and other issues, resulting in the government often have to invest more financial resources to achieve the desired goals, financial macro-control and social adjustment function greatly reduced, the public **** product is relatively "expensive". For example, in 2006, the Beijing Municipal Audit Bureau sampled 20 hospitals 537 million yuan of equipment purchase project funds, the purchase of equipment for that year, only 261 million yuan of expenditure, the newly purchased equipment, only three hospitals have all the equipment put into use; in 2005, Beijing's two levels of finance in Fangshan, Huairou, Mentougou, Pinggu, Miyun, Yanqing and other six districts and counties **** 123 million yuan of investment in the construction of 1350 Village health service stations, the second year of sampling, due to a lack of medical personnel, insufficient operating funds, the initial site selection is unreasonable, not to build the necessary working and living facilities, 112 are not put into use (33% of the amount of sampling).
Many government investment projects are not real work in advance, the budget is very thick (and even some intentionally low budget for approval and then additional), the bidding system is not sound, the construction supervision mechanism does not play its due role in the actual operation of the illegal phenomenon is common, layers of subcontracting, jerry-built, to meet the deadline and other issues often occur, such as the just delivered to use that is full of loopholes in the Beijing West Railway Station is the The case in point is the Beijing West Railway Station.
Obstacles four: repeated audits, the law has no deterrent effect
Currently China's budget implementation of the audit, can not be said to be less vigorous. But in the over-budget expenditures, false expenditures, misappropriation, unauthorized changes in the use of funds, slow budget implementation and other audit content of the "repeat offenders", many audited units are still "emboldened".
Survey found that there are some special phenomena in the financial expenditure, such as "legal and unreasonable" and other concerns. For example, in order to change the slow implementation of the budget, the Beijing Municipality has put forward "half of the time and half of the task" requirements, the financial sector has also introduced relevant supporting measures. However, in the actual financial expenditure process, but appeared simply to pursue the implementation of the rate and ignored the effect of the use of financial funds, and even appeared "in order to legal and illegal" strange phenomenon. Such as a unit of false expenditures, the project has not yet begun to pay in advance into the account of the other party, and then call the money back to comply with the relevant provisions of the rate of financial expenditures.
In order to solve the problem of "legal and unreasonable", the budgetary units have adopted some "workaround" practices, so there is a "reasonable but not legal" situation. For example, because of the long-term unadjusted travel standards, resulting in accommodation over the standard "normal"; "for a reason" or "extenuating circumstances" unauthorized changes in the use of expenditures or special funds transfer or The first time I saw this, I was in the middle of a long journey, and it was a long time coming.
In the findings of the audit department also found that the flow of funds for scientific research projects there are more serious problems. Scientific research projects often need to spend a large amount of money later, in order not to affect the progress of the payment, the current "usual" practice is to first raise the project funds, with the time to make up for it, resulting in the books show the flow of funds often do not match the actual use of the situation. For example, a sum of money is raised by purchasing shopping cards in shopping malls, etc., and then replenished after the project is closed by paying for printing costs, expert evaluation fees, hospitality (meals) and other expenses. The use of project funds to buy consumer goods, and even high-grade consumer goods is very serious, some projects account for a large proportion of the cost of meals, but also the phenomenon of "private" project funds.
A scientific researcher who undertakes social science research projects explained that it is impractical to stipulate that members of the project team should not be allowed to extract labor expenses. In reality, project leaders must pay labor fees in disguise in order to mobilize the enthusiasm of researchers for declaring projects and related work. At the same time, the subject research (especially social sciences) need the support and cooperation of the relevant departments and personnel, in order to the sustainable development of the subject research, the occurrence of meals or hospitality
is inevitable, which is also in line with the "humane society", "food culture
This is also in line with the "humane society" and "food culture" of the country.
| Comment |
Heavy emphasis on system construction
Xiong Ying
The reality of the formation of the four persistent problems of local government financial expenditures is very complex reasons, of which the institutional level deserves attention. The current financial system has many defects, such as the absence of the legal system, there is a conflict between the legal norms, the legal provisions are divorced from the actual situation, the supporting system is unscientific or not rigorous and so on. For example, in order to meet the legal provisions on the growth of UNESCO, health and agriculture (i.e., the requirement of "legal expenditure"), a certain percentage of fiscal revenue must be invested in the relevant areas. However, the amount of revenue growth each year is not known until the end of the year, making it difficult to incorporate excess revenue into budget management. The government's revenue plan is set too low, resulting in too much over-recovery at the end of the year, which greatly increases the total amount of unannounced fiscal appropriations (Beijing's fiscal revenue plan for 2007 grew by 13%, but the actual growth was 33.6%); on the issue of special transfers, because of its inherent uncertainty, the amount of funds is large, and the time of appropriation is late, and the differences in the time of convening of the National People's Congresses (NPCs) at all levels each year (the lower-level NPCs are convened before the higher-level NPCs). In the case of special transfers, because of their inherent characteristics of uncertainty, large amounts of funds, late disbursement, and the difference in the time of the convening of the NPCs at each level each year (lower-level NPCs convene before higher-level NPCs), it is difficult for lower-level governments to incorporate the funds allocated by the higher-levels into the budgetary expenditure programs of their own. The "softening" of supervision and the "absence" of accountability are even more prominent. The survey shows that "lack of accountability" is one of the major reasons for "repeated audits". In practice, the auditing authority will almost not use the "administrative punishment power" given by law, and even the "punishment recommendation power" is difficult to start. Individual acts that do not yet constitute a crime, it is difficult to hold accountable, the punishment of unit behavior is more difficult to achieve. Lack of "accountability" of the "supervision", "big things small, small things" or although written in the audit results report, but ultimately "black not mentioned, white not mentioned "Many budget units are not afraid of being audited out of the problem funds. Already spent financial funds (such as illegal bonuses), but also "splash out of water", generally difficult to recover.
Secondly, the prevalence of unscientific budgeting. "Overstatement" of the budget is a common mentality of financial staff, worried about the leadership of the temporary decision to do something, when it is too late to do the budget to ask for money.
Third, in the implementation of the budget, or negligence, or knowingly. Some are forced for its survival and development. Such as a secondary school for many years did not give employees long salary, in order to mobilize the enthusiasm of the staff, the project balance of funds used to give employees a bonus; some by the interests of the tendency to move. Such as governments at all levels and their financial departments have the right to dispose of financial funds, and at the same time is the first level of the budget unit, so in the allocation of financial funds is easy to tilt to the unit, and can get other relevant departments of power "care". In the questionnaire designed for the budget unit accounting staff, there is such a question: "When the leadership of the instructions and financial discipline is inconsistent, how will you do?" Almost all respondents chose this answer: "remind the leadership attention, if the leadership repeatedly insisted, according to the leadership instructions to do." Obviously, this is also a form of knowing what to do. In addition, the traditional practices, inertia, and outdated financial concepts of decision-makers and implementers are also causes that cannot be ignored. Some leading cadres have developed the habit of "head shot" decision-making. Leaders "clap" usually do not have "repeated offenses" intentionally, often still for the people to do practical things, do good things. However, due to the neglect of decision-making procedures and budgetary expenditure rules, the result is often caused by the subordinate departments of the behavior of the law.
Budgetary reform has progressed rapidly in recent years, but some units are still using the budget system before the reform of the practice, such as a school has been to maintain the establishment of the "principal fund". A senior auditor surveyed, said the current head of the budget unit is not without legal awareness, but many of them are not able to keep up with the development of the concept of budgetary reform and development of the situation. For example, the vast majority of people are aware of can not set up a "small treasury", but for extrabudgetary funds should be included in the budget management lack of correct understanding. The leaders of the institutions generally believe that "since the source of funds is not the financial allocation but the unit 'income generation', should be freely disposed of by the unit." ■