Ten percent vanished from the budget. The referendum is going ahead anyway.

On Sunday, October 4, after two sessions, the government finally approved the budget documents for 2027 and 2028. For next year the budget projects €17 billion in revenue and just under €19.4 billion in expenditure, which means a deficit of just under three percent of gross domestic product. A year later, with similar expenditure and somewhat higher revenue, the deficit is meant to fall to two percent of GDP.

Finance Minister Andrej Šircelj said after the session that the two documents bring no new taxes and comply with the fiscal rules. At the same time, he settled accounts with the previous government without holding back.

"Above all in wages, personal incomes and other spending, it was financial debauchery. This spending grew without any oversight, even contrary to their own plans, which meant wage growth was around 10 percent." (translated)

More interesting than the figures is what vanished from the document between Thursday's and Sunday's sessions. On Friday, the portal Necenzurirano, having seen the material, reported that the draft budget for next year announces a ten percent reduction in the number of employees in the public sector and municipalities, and a further ten percent in 2028. Only the police, the Slovenian Armed Forces, the prison administration and the financial administration were to be exempt. The coalition leadership then discussed the plan.

By Sunday the mention of that figure had disappeared from the document. Prime Minister Janez Janša admitted at a press conference that one of the drafts did contain a ten percent reduction, but said that this part has since been removed from the document. In his words, staffing plans for now match those in this year's supplementary budget, meaning no announced cut or increase in the number of employees.

Instead of layoffs, Janša announces redeployment, first within the public sector and then partly into the wider economy, where there is a labour shortage, above all in healthcare, social care and elderly care.

"This is not about labelling someone as surplus. It is about simply redeploying, because, all things considered, Slovenia's main strategic problem is demographics." (translated)

The issue, which by his account no longer exists in the budget, will nevertheless be decided in a referendum. Janša has announced a consultative referendum on restructuring the public sector and reducing bureaucracy. Its date depends on the outcome of the referendum on the so-called development, or omnibus, law.

"There is no reason to panic. Nobody will be left without a job." (translated)

The Confederation of Public Sector Trade Unions of Slovenia responded to the announcement with concern and indignation. They warned that such an approach could weaken the accessibility and quality of public services, that the government has presented no expert analyses of the actual needs of individual public services, and that unilateral decision-making without social dialogue is unacceptable to them.

So the government is announcing a referendum on a cut that, at least officially, does not exist. The document was changed between two sessions, and in the meantime the public had already learned what it said before.