The military were promised pay rises, but there is no money in the budget
The amendments to the state budget do not include funding for a comprehensive reform of military pay, even though the authorities had previously spoken publicly about reviewing pay in the armed forces.
This was stated by MP Yaroslav Zheleznyak following a meeting of the Verkhovna Rada’s Budget Committee on 8 June. According to him, on 9 June, parliament is due to consider the amendments to the state budget for the second reading.
Zheleznyak claims that during the meeting, the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Finance effectively confirmed that whilst a mechanism for increasing minimum pay for military personnel exists, the budget does not provide for a full-scale reform of military pay.
“In any case, all these promises that were made, and let me remind you that promises to increase, review or even reform pay in the army were made to us by Yulia Svyrydenko, and accordingly by Defence Minister Fedorov, and by President Zelenskyy, and even by Syrskyy, are not currently reflected in the state budget. No money has been allocated for this,” Zheleznyak stated.
On the increase to 30,000 UAH
According to Zheleznyak, the committee discussed the possibility of raising pay for military personnel receiving the minimum allowance, from approximately 20,000 UAH to 30,000 UAH.
He stated that the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Finance had confirmed the existence of a mechanism that allows this to be done without changing the entire pay scale.
This does not involve revising the base pay level, but rather an additional allowance for certain categories of military personnel.
Vasyl Shkurakov, a representative of the Ministry of Defence, explained to the committee that direct intervention in the basic pay grades could create imbalances within the pay system.
According to him, there are currently around 60 pay grades for military personnel. If only the lowest grades are changed, this could create an inversion within the pay system and worsen the social situation in the army.
Therefore, according to Shkurakov, the Ministry of Defence is working on a proposal for an additional allowance without altering the basic pay scale.
At the same time, he noted that they plan to resolve this issue within the existing budget for military pay.
The shortfall in payments remains
Zheleznyak stated that the shortfall in funding for military salaries has still not been resolved.
According to him, this has been confirmed by both the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Finance. However, the official size of the shortfall was not disclosed at the committee meeting.
Zheleznyak himself estimated it at at least 180 billion hryvnias.
“There is still a shortfall in funding for our military’s salaries. This has been confirmed by both the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Finance. No one has yet specified the size of this shortfall, but give or take, I think it would be fair to say that it is no less than 180 billion hryvnias,” said the MP.
He predicts that as early as this autumn, and possibly even in August, the government may again approach parliament regarding amendments to the state budget due to a lack of funds for the army.
Which amendments the committee did not support
Zheleznyak reported that he had submitted a number of amendments to the state budget, which were intended to restrict the government’s ability to spend funds on programmes he describes as populist.
In particular, this concerned amendment No. 99, which was intended to prohibit the launch of new budget programmes for the use of the fund for the elimination of the consequences of armed aggression.
He also mentioned amendment No. 344, which was intended to restrict the use of the reserve fund for programmes such as cashback schemes, ‘eBachka’ and other payments not directly related to the army or the elimination of the consequences of aggression.
According to Zheleznyak, none of his amendments were supported by the committee.
“Do you know how many of my amendments passed the committee vote? Zero. Not a single one was supported,” he stated.
The MP claims that these amendments were aimed not at increasing expenditure, but at reallocating funds: to remove the possibility of spending money on other programmes and transfer it to the Ministry of Defence for payments to the military.
Why isn’t the pay scale being changed?
A separate part of the discussion concerned why payments to military personnel are not being increased by changing the minimum level in the pay scale.
According to the Ministry of Defence, such a model could automatically affect the entire pay scale system.
Zheleznyak stated that this is precisely why the discussion centres on a top-up to the minimum level, rather than a direct increase in the base rate.
In his estimation, raising minimum payments to 30,000 UAH for six months could cost around 20 billion UAH or even less. However, this is merely the MP’s estimate, not an official government calculation.
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