From August 2008 to March 2009, with the assistance of the Financial and Economic Committee of the Standing Committee of Beijing Municipal People's Congress, the "Investigation and Analysis Group of Local Financial Expenditure Status" took Beijing municipal (county) governments as samples, visited the Municipal Finance Bureau, the Municipal Audit Bureau, the People's Congress of Dongcheng, Xicheng, Haidian and Pinggu, and the financial, auditing and supervision departments of some districts and counties, and interviewed more than 10 administrative undertakings.
Chronic disease 1: excessive official consumption has become a collective activity.
According to the survey, huge official consumption, such as eating and drinking with public funds, traveling at public expense and building high-grade buildings and halls, has become a common collective activity of the government.
One of the manifestations is that vested interests resist or resist institutional constraints in disguise. For example, studying abroad has basically evolved into a kind of welfare treatment for various administrative institutions. When the financial department requests to cut the funds for studying abroad, it will encounter some resistance. The bus reform has the greatest resistance, and even there have been cases where more financial input has to be stopped after the reform. Although the specific reform plans vary from place to place, they all have a common feature, that is, the target of reform is the decision makers and executors who preside over the reform.
The reason for the failure of reform is that the reform policy pays too much attention to how to compensate the losses of vested interests, while ignoring the losses and injuries caused by the current system and the results of "reform" to public finances and taxpayers.
Second, the constraints on the power sector are weak. Usually, it is the government, finance, taxation, courts and other power departments that have the ability to build high-end buildings and halls. For example, the office building project of a local finance bureau that seriously exceeds the standard has been officially approved by four or five government departments such as the local development and reform commission and the planning bureau. According to the analysis of the local discipline inspection and supervision department, "because the Finance Bureau is a power unit", the relevant departments have "the problem of not adhering to principles because of face", thus forming a situation of how the Finance Bureau approves and reports. The same is true for the constraints of local government functional departments. It is conceivable that the constraint on the "second in command" of the party and government is naturally powerless.
Third, because of the loopholes and irrationality of the existing system. Administrative institutions often spend money for the sake of spending money. For example, the scientific research project of a department's research room was postponed for one year, but the use period of project funds was not extended. Then, according to the requirements of the system, all the money must be spent suddenly according to the original deadline, and public inspection at home and abroad must be arranged if it is not spent. A similar situation is not uncommon. The reason why some units collectively use public funds to eat and drink is often to spend money.
Fourth, there is a general lack of public finance concept. Friends get together to pay the bill, and the last one stands up and says, "I'll pay, and the unit can reimburse." So everyone accepted it gladly, and even reached the understanding that if you can spend public money, you don't have to spend personal money. "Others can't take advantage of it, and public funds can't take advantage of it." It has become a fashion for public departments, brother units and superiors to treat each other warmly with public funds; It is normal to remind subordinates "don't forget to express their feelings" before holidays; When the superior department went to the subordinate unit, eating and swimming became a habit. When the same system unit carries out courtesy exchange in different provinces and exchanges needed goods, excessive official consumption will form a collective activity, coupled with "the law does not blame the public" and "herd mentality", it is difficult to control the problem of official consumption.
Chronic disease 2: spending money suddenly becomes more and more severe at the end of the year.
In the fourth quarter of each year, the "group purchase cards" of major shopping malls and book buildings are in a "hot sale" state, and the budget units that come to buy them are in an endless stream. This is just one of the manifestations of "spending money at the end of the year". The disadvantages of "spending money by surprise at the end of the year" are obvious, which is not conducive to the rational use of financial funds, causing waste and affecting the realization of the expected effect of financial expenditure. In recent years, "spending money by surprise at the end of the year" has become increasingly fierce. Although the situation of "spending money by surprise at the end of the year" is different in different regions and different budget units, this problem is not obvious in grassroots local governments with small financial capital flow. However, all the "budget units" eager to spend all their money before the end of the year have the same original intention: they are worried that if the balance is "cleared", the financial allocation for the coming year may be affected.
This operation result is mainly caused by several situations in budget preparation and implementation:
In the first case, the budget of the budget unit is false. In the process of project budgeting, the balance of budget units is too much, and after the financial funds are allocated, it can't be arranged for a while, so we have to spend money suddenly at the end of the year. The psychology of this false budget is easy to analyze. Instead of worrying about many uncertain factors and unpredictability in the future, it is better to leave room. Just to make up for the lack of public funds; Or simply driven by interests, the more financial funds, the better, not for nothing.
In the second case, the budget unit is slow to implement in the early stage. It is a common phenomenon that budget execution is "loose before and tight after". Or the plan is rough and the preliminary work is not tight; Or worry about not spending enough money in the early stage; There are also some objective factors, such as the long time of government procurement leading to the delay of fiscal expenditure; Some projects failed to complete the relevant procedures for a while, which delayed the start-up time and caused the financial expenditure to move back; Due to the inspection and acceptance period of the project, or some renovation projects (such as college dormitory) can only be started on holidays and other special problems, such as relocation.
In the third case, some financial funds are allocated late and the amount is uncertain. As far as the budget unit is concerned, it is unknown how much money can be "received" from the financial department in the second half of the year, or how much money the financial department can add. Sometimes some financial funds are allocated very late (such as 1 1 month and February), which makes it inevitable to spend money at the end of the year.
Chronic disease 3: Redistribution ignores interests and fiscal expenditure is inefficient.
In recent years, with the increase of fiscal revenue year by year and the establishment of the goal of building a harmonious society, the government's financial investment in people's livelihood construction has shown a rapid growth trend. At the same time, the problem of low efficiency of fiscal expenditure of governments at all levels is highlighted, which is mainly manifested in slow allocation, idle funds, idle equipment, repeated construction, repeated allocation, and inefficient or ineffective financial input.
Judging from the efficiency of financial fund allocation, decision-making mistakes are the main reasons for the inefficiency of financial expenditure. There are many "image projects" and "performance projects" that waste people's money and are useless. Due to the lack of scientific argumentation and legal procedures, a large number of financial fund allocation projects have been repeatedly constructed and allocated. For example, in 2006, Beijing Audit Bureau randomly checked the management and use of special subsidy funds in seven districts and counties such as Changping, and found that 3 1 project in six districts and counties had multiple or repeated declarations, involving subsidy funds of 370 million yuan. In terms of capital construction investment, due to compartmentalization, many budget units can not only obtain financial funds from governments at the same level, but also obtain secondary distribution from higher-level industry authorities. Coupled with the lack of unified planning and coordination, "the road is constantly being cut." From April 14 to February 22, 2006, the Yongding section of Beijing was excavated by four pipeline units in four times. Wrong decision not only can't realize the optimal allocation of social resources and public resources, but also will cause huge losses and waste.
Judging from the efficiency of the use of financial funds, the problems of idle funds, idle equipment and poor project quality often lead the government to invest more financial resources to achieve the expected goals, the functions of fiscal macro-control and social regulation are greatly reduced, and public goods are relatively "expensive". For example, in 2006, Beijing Audit Bureau randomly checked the use of 537 million yuan of equipment purchase project funds in 20 hospitals. In that year, the equipment purchase expenditure was only 2.6/kloc-0.0 billion yuan, and only 3 hospitals in the newly purchased equipment were put into use; In 2005, two levels of finance in Beijing invested 1350 village health service stations in six districts and counties of Fangshan, Huairou, Mentougou, Pinggu, Miyun and Yanqing. In the second year, due to the shortage of medical staff, insufficient operating funds, unreasonable site selection in the early stage, and failure to build necessary working and living facilities, there were 65,438 people.
Many government investment projects have false preliminary work, rough budget estimates (even some deliberately depress the budget estimates to obtain approval before adding them), the bidding system is not perfect, and the construction supervision mechanism has not played its due role. In practice, illegal phenomena are common, and problems such as subcontracting, cutting corners, and catching up with the construction period often occur. For example, Beijing West Railway Station, which has just been put into use, is full of loopholes.
Chronic disease 4: Repeated trials and repeated crimes, the law has no deterrent.
At present, the audit of budget implementation in China is not strong enough. However, many audited units are still "fearless" about "repeated offenses" in audit contents, such as exceeding budget expenditure, falsifying expenditure, misappropriating, changing the use of funds without authorization and slow budget implementation.
It is worth paying attention to the special phenomena such as "legal and unreasonable" in financial expenditure. For example, in order to change the slow implementation of the budget, Beijing has put forward the requirement of "halving time and tasks", and the financial department has also introduced relevant supporting measures. However, in the actual financial expenditure process, there has been a problem of simply pursuing the implementation rate and ignoring the effect of the use of financial funds, and even a strange phenomenon of "breaking the law for the sake of legality". If a company falsely lists expenses, it will transfer the project funds that have not yet started to the other party's account in advance, and then return the funds to meet the relevant provisions of the financial expenditure rate.
In order to solve the "legal and unreasonable" problem, the budget unit has adopted some "flexible" practices, so there has been a "reasonable and illegal" situation. It is "normal" if the accommodation exceeds the standard due to long-term failure to adjust the travel expenses standard; "There are reasons" or "excusable" to change the purpose of expenditure or transfer special funds or use them for other purposes.
In the investigation results of the audit department, it is also found that there are serious problems in the flow of funds for scientific research projects. Scientific research projects often need to spend a lot of money in the later stage. In order not to affect the progress of payment, the current "usual" practice is to raise project funds first, and then make up for them when they are used, which often causes the flow of funds shown on the books to be inconsistent with the actual use. For example, if you buy a shopping card in a shopping mall and raise a sum of money, you can pay back the printing fee, expert review fee, entertainment fee (meal fee) and other expenses after settlement. It is very serious to use project funds to buy daily consumer goods, even high-end consumer goods. Some projects have a large proportion of meals, and there is still a phenomenon of "dividing up" project funds.
A researcher who undertakes a social science research project explained that it is unrealistic for the members of the research group not to extract labor fees. In reality, in order to arouse the enthusiasm of scientific researchers to declare projects and related work, project leaders must pay labor fees in disguise. At the same time, subject research (especially social science) needs the support and cooperation of relevant departments and personnel. For the sustainable development of the research, meals or entertainment expenses are incurred.
It is inevitable, which is also in line with the national conditions of "human society" and "food culture".
| Comment |
Pay attention to system construction
Xiur
The realistic reasons for the formation of the four chronic diseases of local government fiscal expenditure are very complicated, among which the institutional level deserves attention. There are many defects in the current financial system, such as the absence of legal system, the conflict of legal norms, the disconnection between legal provisions and reality, and the unscientific or imprecise supporting system. For example, in order to meet the legal requirements of increasing education, science, culture, health and agriculture according to law (that is, the requirement of "statutory expenditure"), a certain proportion of fiscal revenue must be invested in related fields. How much fiscal revenue will increase each year will not be known until the end of the year, so it is difficult to bring excess revenue into budget management. The government's fiscal revenue plan is set too low, which leads to excessive fiscal surplus at the end of the year, thus greatly increasing the total amount of fiscal surprise allocation (Beijing's fiscal revenue plan increased by 13% in 2007, with a real increase of 33.6%); On the issue of special transfer payment, due to its own uncertainty, large amount of funds, late disbursement time, and the difference in the convening time of people's congresses at all levels every year (the lower people's congresses are held before the higher people's congresses), it is difficult for lower-level governments to incorporate the special funds allocated by their superiors into their budget expenditure plans. The "softening" of supervision and the "absence" of accountability are more prominent. The survey shows that "lack of accountability" is one of the important reasons for "repeated trials and repeated crimes". In practice, audit institutions rarely use the "power of administrative punishment" given by law, and even the "power of punishment suggestion" is difficult to start. It is difficult to investigate the responsibility of individual behavior that has not yet constituted a crime, and it is even more difficult to punish the behavior of the unit. Lack of "supervision" of "accountability" eventually leads to "minor issues" or "black and white", which makes many budget units not afraid of being audited for problem funds. Spent financial funds (such as illegal bonuses) are also "spilled water", which is generally difficult to recover.
Secondly, it is the ubiquitous unscientific budget. "Overreporting" the budget is a common mentality of financial personnel, who are worried that the leaders will decide what to do temporarily, and then they will not get the money if they have no time to make the budget.
Third, in the implementation of the budget, it is either negligence or knowingly. Some are forced by its survival and development. For example, a middle school failed to pay long salaries to its employees for many years, and in order to arouse the enthusiasm of employees, the surplus funds of the project were used to pay bonuses to employees; Some are profit-driven. For example, governments at all levels and their financial departments have the right to control financial funds, and at the same time, they are first-level budget units, so they are easy to lean toward their own units in the allocation of financial funds and can be "taken care of" by other relevant power departments. There is such a question in the questionnaire designed for accountants in budget units: "What will you do when the instructions of the leaders are inconsistent with the financial discipline?" Almost all the interviewees chose this answer: "Remind the leaders that if they insist on it again and again, they will follow the instructions of the leaders." Obviously, this is also a kind of knowingly. In addition, the traditional practices, inertia thinking and outdated financial concepts of policy makers and executors are also reasons that cannot be ignored. Some leading cadres have developed the habit of "patting their heads" to make decisions. When making decisions, leaders usually have no intention of "repeating crimes", and often do practical things and do good things for the people. However, due to the neglect of decision-making procedures and budget expenditure rules, the result often leads to illegal behavior of subordinate departments.
In recent years, the budget reform has made rapid progress, but some units still follow the practice before the budget system reform. For example, a school has been setting up a "principal fund". A senior auditor said in the survey that the current heads of budget units are not without legal awareness, but many can't keep up with the situation of budget reform and development. For example, at present, most people realize that "small treasury" cannot be set up, but they lack a correct understanding that extra-budgetary funds should be included in budget management. The leaders of public institutions generally believe that "since the source of funds is not financial allocation but the unit's' income generation', it should be freely controlled by the unit." ■