Vehicle costs still high in 'three public expenditures'

Sixteen government departments published their annual budgets Tuesday as part of the municipality's plan to strengthen public supervision of the "three public expenditures."

"Three public expenditures" is the term referring to government spending on overseas trips, food and entertainment and buying and maintaining public vehicles. According to the municipal government's website, before March 26, around 90 municipal-level departments will publish their three public expenditures.

The municipal government has said this is an improvement on last year, as apart from departments involved with confidential information, all other departments should publish their budget.

Last year, 76 municipal departments made their budgets publicly available, according to a report on China News Service on March 16, 2012.

The municipal government started making the spending on the three public expenditures public in 2011. The total spending on the three public expenditures is 1.11 billion yuan ($179 million) for 2013, and in 2012 it was 1.12 billion yuan.

Although the government cut 10 million yuan from the overall budget, buying and maintaining vehicles still remains the most costly expense.

Beijing Municipal Administration of Cultural Heritage's spending on public vehicles increased by 1.3 million yuan from 505,000 yuan in 2012, the People's Daily reported.

Kong Fanzhi, director of the administration, told the Global Times that this is because the administration did not purchase vehicles last year.

"We didn't buy any last year, and this year we scrapped many old cars, so we'll buy new ones. We have taken measures to save money, including combining meetings and buying 'working meals' instead of formal dinners," said Kong.

From the published statistics of the 16 departments, involving 214.85 million yuan for the three public expenditures, 86.2 percent was used for purchasing and maintaining vehicles, calculated according to government figures.

Wang Yukai, a professor with the Chinese Academy of Governance, said he believes there is still plenty of room to cut the vehicle budget.

"Many departments which don't need vehicles have purchased cars, and those which need a car have purchased luxurious cars made by foreign companies. Both activities are corruption. Government departments should purchase vehicles made by Chinese manufacturers to set a good example as well as to save money," said Wang.