By: Dr Vinko Gorenak
When I was still a member of the National Assembly (DZ), I often heard complaints about the supposedly lavish salary, chauffeur, official vehicle – not to mention claims that the world’s best chefs cook for MPs and that we practically eat lunch for free. This is an idealised, utopian image of parliamentarians that has never been true – nor is it today, of course. If I focus solely on parliamentary meals, I wrote even back then that in my local area – specifically in a local agricultural canteen – I could get a rich lunch much cheaper than what a lunch costs me at the DZ. But let’s leave that aside; most people do not even believe this information, even though it is accurate.
A few days ago, I came across a response on the website of the National Assembly (DZ) to a parliamentary question posed by MP Anton Šturbej, who asked the Government of the Republic of Slovenia how much was spent on representation by the Office of Prime Minister Robert Golob and by individual ministries in 2024. I compared the data with the response to the same question by the same MP in 2023 and was extremely unpleasantly surprised. Let me summarise the numbers. From January 1st to May 31st, 2022, the cabinet of Janez Janša, along with all ministries, spent €83,910.90 on representation. From June 1st to December 31st, 2022, Robert Golob’s cabinet spent €105,228.64. But here is the truly astonishing part: from January 1st to December 31st, 2024, Golob’s cabinet and all ministries together spent a staggering €1,844,452.23 on representation. Yes, you read that correctly – almost ten times more than what both the Janša and Golob governments spent in 2022 combined.
I fully understand that to the average person these figures may seem quite abstract. To put it in more relatable terms, let’s return to the topic of meals in the DZ. A meal at the National Assembly today costs €8.50. Robert Golob, along with his ministers and guests, consumes the equivalent of 594 parliamentary meals every day – at your expense. Let’s get even more specific: the current Minister of Defence, Borut Sajovic, or his predecessor Marjan Šarec, consumed 142 parliamentary meals per day with their guests in 2024. Foreign Minister Tanja Fajon consumed 65 parliamentary meals per day with her guests. Add to that Aleksander Jevšek, one of the least effective ministers, who heads the Ministry for Cohesion and has, in this term, secured the least EU funding from Brussels, yet spent on representation the equivalent of 39 parliamentary meals per day.
But as the saying goes: “Before you criticise others, look in the mirror.” So let me do that as well. In 2012, I served as Minister of the Interior. It was a year of severe austerity. I followed this principle personally. I instructed my chief of cabinet that no employee, including myself, was allowed to drink even one coffee or tea at the state’s expense. She followed that instruction strictly. I no longer have the exact figures, but I can state with certainty that our representation spending was very minimal. We followed the government’s decree, which defines what representation costs entail. From memory, I can say these were expenses for hosting ambassadors and government representatives from foreign countries who visited me in my role as Minister of the Interior. No one received lunch – only coffee, tea, water, or juice. If I recall correctly, I also invited the authors of two police bills to lunch, along with a group of young police officers – and that was it.
In any case, when it came to representation spending, I behaved with extreme prudence. I would say I was emulating then-President Borut Pahor, who did the same. Still, I am not entirely sure I would act the same way again.
