In addition to party funding from the federal and state governments, party-affiliated factions in the Chamber of Commerce and Labor also receive funding. Last year that was almost 28 million euros, according to the responses to questions from the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Labor to NEOS. That is slightly less than the federal government’s party funding (nearly 31 million euros). According to NEOS estimates, the economic association affiliated with the ÖVP will benefit most from the SP union members.
Officially, the Department of Labor estimates only the total amount of funding, but not how it is distributed among the individual factions. Here the NEOS do it with an estimate based on the Chamber of Commerce elections or the Chamber of Commerce election results. Most of the money goes to the entrepreneurs’ association ÖVP (13.7 million euros), for the SP union members (4.7 million euros), the SP-related entrepreneurs’ association (2.2 million euros) and the green economy (1.9 million euros). euros). According to party information, the pink Economic Chamber faction UNOS receives about 300,000 euros per year.
In the case of the Chamber of Commerce, the money is paid through the nine chambers of state. In the case of the Chamber of Commerce, there is an extra subsidy pot from the Austrian Chamber of Commerce in addition to the federal states. It is striking that the Austrian Chamber of Commerce alone, with 7.7 million euros, distributes almost as much faction money as all Chambers of Labor together (8 million euros). In total, the ten chambers of commerce distributed about 20 million euros last year, 1.8 million euros more than originally planned. The Vienna Chamber of Commerce alone spent three million euros, twice as much as announced in the 2021 estimate.
NEOS calls for reduction of faction funding
NEOS MP Gerald Loacker asked the Ministry of Economic Affairs for the figures. He is calling on the chambers to cut faction funding. “Instead of channeling the money from the forced members to the parties, the chambers could lower the contributions so that their members have more money in their pockets. That would be a real contribution to relieve people, especially in times of crisis like this.” Loacker said in a statement.
Compared to the 2020 election year, the amount of funding from the economic chambers has fallen from 24.7 to almost 20 million euros. For this year, the fractions in the Chamber of Commerce can count on 20.2 million euros, those in the Chamber of Commerce on 8.2 million euros.
Source: Krone
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