Sixty percent public debt barrier may be crossed

Witold Orłowski, head of the president's economic advisors, informed the Sej m yesterday that the country was on the verge of surpassing the constitution al barrier of 60% public debt. "With the present structure of the budget, we have already crossed the 55% level of public indebtedness. There is a high p robability that the 60% level will also be crossed," Orłowski told the Commi ssion of Public Finances, which was discussing the implementation of last ye ar's budget. He assessed the 2002 budget as being realistic; however, "It fa iled to provide solutions to structural problems." Deputy Finance Minister, Halina Wasilewska-Trenkner, notified the commission of a number of discrepan cies between last year's budget project and its realization, such as, the in flation rate, which stood at 1.9% at the end of 2002, despite the project ha ving predicted that it would reach 3%. (www.onet.pl) K.Z.