Expenditure under the Operational and Maintenance Expenditure category amounted to Lm16 million during the first five months of 2005, compared to Lm24.8 million last year, the National Statistics Office reported yesterday. This represents a fall of Lm8.8 million or 35.4 per cent, the main reason being the reclassification of expenditure on medical and surgical materials from under this expenditure category to the Programmes and Initiatives Category in 2005.
Expenditure under the Special Expenditure category amounted to Lm0.2 million and Lm0.3 million for the 2005 and 2004 comparative periods respectively.
Expenditure under the Programmes and Initiatives category amounted to Lm186.1 million this year and stood at 41.8 per cent of this year’s budget estimates. Last year’s outlay under this category amounted to Lm160.6 million, and made up 40.5 per cent of that year’s final out-turn. The net increase, in absolute terms, of Lm25.5 million is mainly due to increases in Social Security benefits (+Lm5.4 million), EU own resources (+Lm8.1 million), MGI/MIMCOL (+Lm2 million), financing of church schools (+Lm2.3 million), food subsidies (+Lm1.2 million), street and road lighting, (+Lm1.7 million), Treasury pensions (+Lm1.3 million) and due to the reclassification explained earlier, medicines and surgical supplies (+Lm6.6 million).
On the other hand, lower expenditure was registered under compensation payment by government (-Lm6.6 million) which represented a once-only payment effected by government in 2004 as compensation for the increase in VAT rate announced in the 2004 budget speech.
Outlay under the Contribution to Government Entities category during the first five months of 2005 fell by Lm2.6 million and amounted to Lm32.9 million, down from last year’s figure of Lm35.4 million. The main reason for the decrease under this category was lower expenditure in respect of MGI/MIMCOL (-Lm1.9 million) and Water Services Corporation (-Lm0.8 million).
The interest component of the public debt servicing costs this year increased by Lm1.2 million, from Lm31.7 million last year to Lm32.9 million in 2005. While interest on government stocks increased by Lm1.8 million, interest payments on Treasury bills and on foreign borrowing declined by Lm0.6 million and Lm0.04 million respectively.
During the first five months of 2005, capital expenditure amounted to Lm52.7 million, registering an increase of Lm10.8 million or 25.9 per cent, compared to the expenditure of Lm41.9 million for the January to May period of 2004.
The main reasons for this increase were higher outlays in the Ministries for Justice and Home Affairs (+Lm1.5 million) and Finance (+Lm17.3 million), mainly due to reclassification of expenditure on the Mater Dei Hospital project, and Rural Affairs and the Environment (+Lm3.2 million). On the other hand, lower expenditure was registered under Health, Elderly and Community Care (-Lm14.8 million) mainly due to the reclassification of the Mater Dei Hospital project mentioned above.
The Central Government debt outstanding at the end of May amounted to Lm1,390.1 million, an increase of Lm52.5 million or 3.9 per cent, on the Lm1,337.6 million outstanding at the end of May 2004. The total outstanding debt includes the current balance (Lm27.4 million) of Government’s assumption of debts of the ex-Malta Drydocks and of the ex-Malta Shipbuilding. The Sinking Fund investments in Government debt (Lm1.9 million) have been deducted from the total outstanding balance.