Minister of the Interior and Safety Yoon Ho-jung has stated that there is a need to fundamentally improve the fire-fighting financial structure, which has faced criticism for imposing excessive burdens on local governments.

During the comprehensive audit by the National Assembly Public Administration and Security Committee today (the 26th), when People Power Party lawmaker Kwon Young-jin asked whether he had lived up to the high expectations fire officials held when he was appointed minister last year—given that he led the transition of local fire officials to national public servants in 2019—Minister Yoon replied, "It fell far short."

In response to criticisms that regional disparities persist even after the conversion of fire services to a national system, and that the central government's share of the fire budget stands at a mere 10.7%, he explained, "Because fire budgets are tied to tax revenues rather than being steadily increased or decreased as needed, there has been a certain limitation in the state covering fire budgets."

He added, "I believe the time has come to fundamentally improve these aspects."

Pointing out structural issues in the current fire budget allocation, Minister Yoon said, "Even though fire officials were converted from local to national government employees, fire-fighting duties remain local autonomous affairs," adding, "Local and central governments have no choice but to jointly create budgets for matters related to fire services."

He continued, "Lawmakers only came to realize around August of this year that the fire budget was reduced by about 300 billion won compared to last year," and explained, "It is difficult to reflect this in the government budget or to revise and submit tax laws, which are budget-incidental bills."

At the time of the transition of fire personnel to national status, the government raised the allocation rate of the individual consumption tax imposed on cigarettes toward the Fire Safety Grant from 20% to 45% in order to secure the financial resources necessary for expanding firefighting personnel.

However, because the cigarette-based individual consumption tax is affected by tobacco consumption, a decline in cigarette-based individual consumption tax inevitably leads to a decrease in the Fire Safety Grant.

According to the National Fire Agency, this year's Fire Safety Grant of 935.5 billion won is actually projected to shrink by 259.5 billion won (27.6%) next year to just 676 billion won.

This amounts to a reduction of nearly 300 billion won in firefighting financial resources per year.

Minister Yoon urged, "I hope that during this budget review process and the process of reviewing tax laws, we can discuss ways to sufficiently secure the fire budget together," adding, "I hope the government and both the ruling and opposition parties can truly put their heads together this time to craft an alternative."

(Photo: Yonhap News)