The protest against the new budget will be peaceful, but the parliament will be blocked. The goal is for the deputies to hear what the Bulgarian people think and to accept reasonable proposals. We are heading towards low incomes, high taxes and impoverishment. The warning we are giving is "do not accept the budget in this form, because you will screw up". This was said by the chairman of "Continuing the Change" and deputy from the PP-DB Assen Vassilev in the studio of "Hello, Bulgaria".
"The meeting of the Budget and Finance Committee will be broadcast live on a big screen in front of the Council of Ministers. We expect the protest to be quite large, a large part of the business community supported it. It is non-political, anyone who does not want to have 600 leva put in their pocket to fill the coffers of the government can join. This will be an expression of the thinking of business and citizens about the new budget," added Vassilev.
According to him, taxes and social security contributions should not be raised, and at the same time some of the expenses should be eliminated. "Our protest has nothing to do with the euro, the goal is for the government to hear the demands of the citizens. The EC warned that it does not believe that the budget deficit will be 3%, as set. That is, the Ministry of Finance is lying. If the forecasts really come true, we will enter a surplus deficit, even if it is 3.1%. This means limiting spending for 2027, in order to fit into the three percent deficit framework," the PP leader pointed out.
According to him, the state has never spent more than 40% of what was produced. "In 2025, for the first time since Zhan Videnov, 43% was spent, 45 is planned, and the desire of the authorities reaches 55%. Raising social security contributions and dividend tax is only the first step. Next year, we will have a progressive tax, they are crossing out the flat tax and everyone will start paying 20-30%. The legacy they are justifying is an increase in spending by 2 billion euros next year. Currently, a growth of 8 billion euros is projected, which is unreasonable. One example is a 20% increase in the salaries of the judiciary - from 24,000 to 30,000 leva. Without it, there will be no point in digging into the pockets of citizens. If the growth remains 5% for everyone in the administration, there will be no need to raise taxes and social security contributions", commented Asen Vassilev.
The former Finance Minister noted that the minimum wage as a percentage of the average leads to a 500 million euro increase in spending in the new budget. "The problems are different - funds are allocated for various coffers in the budget, as well as for uneven salary growth, with some doubling. An example is the funds that were allocated for the Ring Road - for 8 km it was about 2 billion leva. When we raised a fuss, they were reduced to 340 million, which is probably what is needed. Why was the other money there? "For the company that was going to build them," Vassilev also said.