Cabinet Majority Approves Budget Pared by Il 6.9 Billion

The Cabinet voted 13-1 today to approve a budget slashed by IL 6.9 billion from the one originally submitted by Finance Minister Simcha Ehrlich. The vote came after a series of exhausting debates over the economy during the past several weeks. Only Agriculture Minister Ariel Sharon was opposed.

Ehrlich revised his five-year economic program four times in two weeks in an effort to accommodate the objections of his colleagues. The program is intended to curb runaway inflation which, according to the most optimistic view, will soar to a rate of 60 percent this year. The idea is to reduce government spending in the short term and freeze civil service hirings over a long term. Many ministers claimed Ehrlich’s plan would put the greatest burden on the poorest section of society and were loath to accept major cuts in the budgets of their respective ministries.

That issue is still the subject for negotiations between the Treasury and each ministry. Education Minister Zevulun Hammer of the National Religious Party, has threatened to resign if his budget was reduced. Deputy Premier Yigael Yadin said he would step down as chairman of the ministerial committee on social services if those services were cut.

Premier Menachem Begin and Defense Minister Ezes Weizman supported Hammer against further trimming of the education budget. Welzman said he would be willing to see IL 100 million taken from the defense budget if it was transferred to education. Yisrael katz, Minister of labor and Social Betterment, insisted that cuts be mode “in a progressive way. He said “one should not ask the weaker part of the population to carry the some burden, perhaps a heavier burden, than the groups that are better established.”