Even as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that the only way to deal with huge fires is by aerial means, the Ministry of Finance has cut the 2011 aerial firefighting budget by NIS 8 million, according to figures that Minister of Interior Eli Yishai is expected to present to the Knesset Finance Committee tomorrow. "Globes" obtained a copy of the material, which states that the Ministry of Finance allocated just NIS 3.5 million to aerial firefighting in 2011.
After many struggles, in 2010, the Ministry of Interior succeeded in increasing the amount the Ministry of Finance allocated for aerial firefighting by NIS 7.8 million, to a total of NIS 10 million. However, in the 2011 budget, the Ministry of Finance slashed back the amount to NIS 3.5 million. For the sake of comparison, the cost of hiring the Boeing 747 Supertanker aerial firefighter is $2 million for ten hours of operations.
The Ministry of Interior's budget for firefighters' organizations that the ministry will present to the Finance Committee was dictated to the Ministry of Interior by the Ministry of Finance, and cannot be changed. Any change that Yishai asks for will require approval of the Ministry of Finance and the Finance Committee. The budget, as it will be presented tomorrow, is scheduled to be approved in its second and third readings by the Knesset plenum on December 26.
The Fire and Rescue Services budget for 2011 is NIS 218 million - 6% of the Ministry of Interior's budget - compared with NIS 171 million in 2010. For the first time, the Ministry of Interior succeeded in anchoring the annual supplement it is given in the original amount allocated by the Ministry of Finance for the item. The ministry's director general updated the budget model of the firefighters' organizations to include preferential criteria, such as the socioeconomic conditions of local authorities, communities in the periphery and high-risk areas.
The supplement, according to a cabinet decision of 2010, was NIS 100 million, but to date, the Ministry of Interior has received only NIS 40 million, and then only as authorizations of commitments, not cash. According to the cabinet decision, the ministry will only receive the money after ordering equipment.
Ministry of Interior figures that will be disclosed tomorrow state that, before 2005, the government never supported the upgrading of firefighting equipment. Since 2008, there has been only a meager amount of NIS 10 million out of the original budget.
Yishai today toured communities damaged by the Carmel fire. He said, "We're a country in which the authorities, in other words, Ministry of Finance officials, shake off their public responsibilities, while we, the elected officials, have our authority taken from us in favor of the Ministry of Finance officials. I won't let the bureaucracy at the Ministry of Finance delay the recovery process. We successfully completed the defensive stage, and we're now starting the construction."
The Ministry of Finance said in response, "The money in the Interior budget is not the firefighting fund at all. The fund is allocated at Jewish National Fund as follows: 10% to the Israel Nature and National Parks Protection Authority, 60% Ministry of Interior, and 30% Jewish National Fund. Ordinarily there is NIS 6 million, and this year we were asked to add NIS 3 million and to bring forward NIS 3.5 million from 2011. We have approved these supplements."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on December 6, 2010
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2010