Making the budget more transparent

http://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/2015/06/04/95173 VOL 22 NO 200 REGD NO DA 1589 | Dhaka, Thursday, June 04 2015

Making the budget more transparent M. S. Siddiqui Budget transparency ensures right to know about taxes, borrowings, and expenditure of public money. Annual budget is the key instrument by which a government translates its policies into action.

The Open Budget Survey conducted by the Open Budget Initiative of the Washington-based civil society, the International Budget Partnership (IBP) is an independent and comparative study on budget transparency and accountability around the world. The Survey assesses each country's budget transparency using internationally accepted criteria developed by multilateral organisations, such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and the International Organisation of Supreme Audit Institutions.

The IBP says an average Bangladeshi citizen fails to get adequate information and opportunities to participate in the government's budget process. Insufficient information makes it challenging for the Bangladeshi citizens to hold the government accountable for its management of public money. However, Bangladesh scored 58 out of 100 on the Open Budget Index (OBI) 2012, higher than the average score of 43 for all the 100 countries surveyed. The situation is improving every year. The country scored 42 on the OBI 2008 and 48 on OBI 2010.

The IBP notes that availability of eight key budget documents are preconditions of assessing transparency of budget. Of these, Bangladesh now publishes four documents - Executive's Budget Proposal, Enacted Budget, Mid-Year Review and Year-end Reports. Pre-Budget Statement, Citizens' Budget, Year-End Report and Audit Report are not timely produced and published.

PRE-BUDGET STATEMENT: The Pre-Budget Statement reflects the culmination of the strategic planning phase of the budget process, in which the officials broadly aligns its policy goals with the resources available under the budget's fiscal framework. This process establishes the parameters of the budget proposal before detailed programme funding decisions are made.

The OECD states that best practice in this area requires the officials to release Pre-Budget Statement to the public at least one month prior to submitting its budget proposal to Parliament.

Good practice also requires the Finance Minister to present the budget proposal to the legislature

at least three months prior to the beginning of the fiscal year. The Pre-Budget Statement must be released at least one month prior to the release of the Ministry's Budget Proposal and ideally at least four months prior to the beginning of the fiscal year.

CITIZENS' BUDGET: Government budgets are filled with so many numbers and so much technical jargon that the ordinary people cannot easily understand what they mean. People need information in an accessible, understandable form to enable them to understand what government is doing with their money and allow them to participate in governmental affairs.

The International Monetary Fund in its Manual on Fiscal Transparency states "A clear and simple summary guide to the budget should be widely distributed at the time of the annual budget." Such a 'Citizens' Budget' serves the public, but can also serve the government by enhancing public knowledge about the budget and the reasoning behind the choices made in putting it together. Citizens' Budgets tend to present an accessible version of the Budget Proposal or the Enacted Budget. Citizens should have access to information in a language and through formats that ordinary people can understand and appreciate. The report provides an overview of the structure, timing and size of the budget. Producing a Citizens' Budget can help a government to develop its capacity to make technical information more accessible, more broadly.

A citizens' budget is a summary of the national budget designed to reach and be understood by as large a segment of the population as possible. By reporting and explaining budget decisions and the state of the public finances simply and clearly, the government can help to demystify the budget beyond the often necessarily technically complex detail in the budget documentation.

Otherwise, the job is left to civil society or the media, who are not always adequately equipped.

It is also a good discipline for policy makers to explain themselves in simple, everyday language.

Publication of a citizens' budget allows a government to explain in plain language the objectives of its budget and to supplement and complement other supporting material such as the budget speech, press releases, web pages, media appearances, etc. It also helps citizens to assess the impact on their own circumstances and on specific groups in society including the effects on the burden of taxation, service provision and employment prospects etc.

YEAR-END REPORT: The year-end report is the government's key accountability document. It should be audited by the Controller and Auditor General (CAG) and be released within six months of the end of the fiscal year. The year-end report shows compliance with the level of revenue and expenditures authorised by Parliament in the budget. Any in-year adjustments to the original budget should be shown separately. The presentation format of the year-end report should mirror the presentation format of the budget. The year-end report, or related documents, should include non-financial performance information, including a comparison of performance targets and actual results achieved where practicable.

AUDIT REPORT: Audit Reports should be produced and published within 24 months after end of the financial year. But in the case of Bangladesh, the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General of Bangladesh (CAG) needs a few years to complete the audit. The audit report is never discussed with the media, unlike the practice in other countries. The legislature's Public Accounts Committee (PAC) discusses the report but the media are not invited.

Bangladesh can improve accountability of the government and rating of transparency by introducing Pre-budget statement, Citizens' Budget, Year-end Report and publishing audit reports on time.

The writer is a Legal Economist. e-mail: shah@banglachemcial.com