Auditor Slams Last-Minute Billions in Budget Transfers to Ministries

Israel’s state comptroller has sharply criticized the Finance Ministry over a pattern of late-year budget transfers and spending without prior Knesset approval, saying the practice harms government operations and weakens parliamentary oversight. In December 2024 alone, the Knesset Finance Committee approved 77 budget transfers totaling about 30 billion shekels, with the largest, 4 billion shekels for the Education Ministry, approved on December 31, the final day of the fiscal year.

The report says many requests were submitted only in the last 10 days of December, leaving too little time for debate and causing some requests to lapse. The comptroller said some transfers were used to retroactively legalize spending already made, effectively patching budget overruns at year-end. He argued that this creates an “approval after the fact” situation that raises legal concerns and undermines the separation of powers, the Knesset’s status, and its authority to set spending priorities.

The auditor also described a broader budgeting method in which the Budget Division assumes ministries will not fully implement their programs on time, so budgets are initially underfunded and later adjusted through transfers. He said this increases dependence on end-of-year changes and can indicate “incorrect, or at least suboptimal, budgeting.” The Finance Ministry’s budget officials replied that in some cases the finance minister himself instructed them to delay filing requests, while the Accountant General’s office blamed late or incomplete budget handling by the Budget Division and the Finance Committee.

The report highlighted several concrete cases. The Health Ministry said much of its 2024 budget reached it only in December, with most of it transferred on December 31 at 23:30, too late for orderly spending. The Education Ministry received about 4 billion shekels on the last day, while the Antiquities Authority ended the year at 120% spending after its transfer request was filed on December 26 but not approved in time. The comptroller said late transfers in 2024 were unusually large, with net changes approved in December totaling about 2.7 billion shekels, more than the total for the previous three years combined.