Compensation for high fuel prices for the most affected sectors, as well as for people with lower incomes – these are the cabinet's plans due to expensive diesel and gasoline.
The government is expected to announce the package of measures within days, which will be for both households and businesses. The transport and agricultural sectors will be compensated, as well as citizens with lower monthly incomes, it is clear from the words of Social Minister Natalia Efremova, bTV reports.
For another day, an increase in the price of diesel is reported, according to data from the Fuelo platform. Today it reaches 1 euro and 94 cents – or 2 cents more than yesterday. The price of gasoline remains at 1 euro and 67 cents.
Damyan Vassilev does not complain about his pension. But he is already starting to limit the amount of fuel he fills up - because of the high prices, and he believes that the state should support people with low incomes.
“The reason is clear - wars and so on, which is not good, but there are a lot of people, sick and retired, with TELKs, they need help. I just saw a column somewhere 1.96, I filled up the other day it was 1.83, but it goes up very quickly“, says Damyan Vassilev.
According to the unions, there should be support for all people with low incomes. And they remind: over 1 million and 400 thousand Bulgarians live below the new poverty threshold of 443 euros.
„There should be general measures, not only for those who have cars - fuels affect everyone, unfortunately. And the second group of measures is for urban and public transport, with a request to maintain the prices of transport documents, not to increase“, points out Plamen Dimitrov from the Confederation of Bulgarian Trade Unions.
The government plans to support not only people with low incomes, but also businesses.
„A large part of the measures are related to the transport and agricultural sectors, they are aimed at supporting these sectors in order to keep prices down. But individuals will also be supported“, says Natalia Efremova.
However, experts believe that with rising prices and an energy crisis, the better measure is to encourage people to get out of their cars.
“There are huge traffic jams in Sofia. This means that people have no motivation to get out of their cars. In such a situation, it might be wiser for the state to limit the prices of public transport or make it free“, comments Martin Vladimirov.
In order not to stimulate overconsumption, every measure should be aimed at businesses and the most vulnerable, experts also believe. The support package is yet to be announced.