The members of the Association of Employers' Organizations in Bulgaria (AOBE) – BICA, BIA, BCCI and KRIB, held yesterday (January 9, 2025) a series of meetings with parliamentary groups in order to secure support for the continuation of compensation for non-household electricity consumers.
During the meetings, the Chairman of the Board of the Association of Industrial Capital in Bulgaria and the rotating Chairman of AOBE for 2025, Vasil Velev, noted the great concern at the start of the New Year, given that there is no adopted budget and an extension law and, accordingly, there is no legal basis for continuing the program to compensate for high electricity prices. He pointed out that for the last two months of last year, the price in Bulgaria on the "day-ahead" market was 50 percent higher than in France, Germany, the Netherlands and many times higher than in Northern Europe, and they compete on the same markets. In his words, this is a three-speed Europe. It is very important for us to have a message to the business that such a mechanism, albeit with a delay, will exist, said Vasil Velev. He pointed out that the Law on the Collection of Revenues and Expenditures in 2025 provides for such a mechanism, but it is not guaranteed. The paragraph alone is not enough, the Council of Ministers must also adopt a compensation program, Velev added.
The employers received support from the parliamentary groups "BSP - United Left", "DPS - New Beginning", "Democracy Rights and Freedoms - DPS" and "We Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria". The representatives of the four parliamentary groups expressed their categorical agreement with the arguments and demands of the employer organizations.
The Speaker of the National Assembly, Natalia Kiselova, who participated in the meeting with the PG "BSP - United Left", undertook to hold the meeting of the Budget Committee by January 15 and to have the second reading of the Law on Revenue and Expenditures on the agenda of the parliament for the following week. Kiselova explained that since the Budget and Finance Committee currently does not have an elected chairman, it schedules its meetings and sets the agenda.
The Draft Law on the Collection of Revenues and the Execution of Expenditures in 2025, which was adopted today in first reading by the parliament, provides for a procedure for collecting targeted contributions from electricity producers to the "Security of the Electricity System" fund, which will be used as a source of financing programs for the payment of compensation to non-household consumers of electricity.
The heads of the employer organizations are scheduled to hold a meeting with the Minister of Energy Vladimir Malinov today (January 10) at 4:00 p.m.
