At the end of March, the outstanding debt of Hungarian public institutions rose to a historic high of HUF 134 billion. Since December, unpaid and overdue debt has increased by HUF 68 billion, that is, the amount of debt has doubled in three months, Népszava wrote based on data from the Hungarian State Treasury (MÁK).
According to MÁK figures, of the 134 billion in debt, only 1.3 billion is tax and contribution debt to the state, 22 billion is public utility debt, 85 billion is unpaid goods and service invoices, and another 21 billion was listed as “other” debt.
285 of the 559 budget institutions have debts, that is, every second budget body is unable to survive on the subsidies due to it.
129 billion of the debt was accumulated by the institutions of the Ministry of the Interior. The areas with the biggest debts, such as education, healthcare, law enforcement and penitentiary, all belong to the ministry led by Sándor Pintér.
At the end of March, medical debts reached HUF 90 billion, that is, 70 percent of the total debt was registered with hospitals and clinics. By the middle of the summer, the government will settle a HUF 104 billion debt in the healthcare sector, which is possible because the debt of foundation-maintained university clinics is not included in the HUF 90 billion debt, as they are no longer public institutions. By the end of April, HUF 63.4 billion in operating support will be provided to settle the debts of hospitals.
- The debt of the police and the penitentiary is HUF 17 billion each.
- The debt of the Klebelsberg Center, which is responsible for part of public education, was HUF 3.4 billion at the end of March.
- The outstanding unpaid debt of government offices was HUF 1.8 billion. 17 of the 20 county and capital offices had debts at the end of the first quarter.
