Knesset increases its own budget by 11%

The increase means an extra NIS 2 million will be allotted to the 2014 Knesset budget, mainly serving MK, worker salaries.

By LAHAV HARKOV
Cabinet standing up Knesset 370 (photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem/The Jerusalem Post)
Cabinet standing up Knesset 370
(photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem/The Jerusalem Post)
The Knesset raised its budget by 11 percent on Monday, with the Knesset House Committee voting to increase it to NIS 606,718,000.
The Knesset’s budget was NIS 52,247,000 lower in 2012, and will increase by nearly NIS 2 million in 2014.
The new budget is NIS 20 million lower than originally planned, after Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein instructed Knesset director-general Ronen Plott to cut expenses.
“This budget reflects the need to cut as much as possible, without shutting down our continuing activities or projects that already began,” Edelstein told the House Committee.
Most of the budget goes to MKs’ and other workers’ salaries and pensions, but the Knesset’s budget also includes car leasing, property tax and the Knesset Channel’s expenses.
Also Monday, Shas leader Arye Deri wrote a letter to Edelstein to reinstate a 10% pay cut for MKs, after the Knesset Labor, Welfare and Health Committee reduced the cut to 1% last Thursday.
“[Cutting MK salaries by 10%] is a worthy thing to do and sets an example, because the Knesset is not detached from the nation and those who are elected must do what they demand from the people,” Deri wrote.
Deri added that, while as an opposition MK he does not have the power to prevent budget cuts that will harm the weak, he is opposed to the Knesset making decisions that only help elected officials.
The Shas leader asked that his own salary be cut by 10%, even if the law is not changed back.
The 1% pay cut passed the final vote in the Knesset with 76 MKs in favor and 9 opposed.