Outgoing government meets for last time

Members of the outgoing government of the Civic Democrats, TOP 09 and LIDEM met for the last time on Wednesday before a new cabinet put together by prime minister designate Jiří Rusnok is named. The new interim cabinet is not yet complete and a new environment minister and finance minister, for example, have yet to be named. The caretaker government is expected to be named next week and will have 30 days to ask for a confidence vote in the lower house.

Absent on Wednesday were Justice Minister Pavel Blažek and the deputy prime minister, Karolína Peake. On the agenda was an assessment of the overall damage caused by floods which hit the country last month as well as the release of 200 million crowns for volunteer fire fighters. In the same cabinet session, the government opted to raise the budget for science and scientific research. Next year, the sector should see an increase of 1.5 billion crowns. The current annual budget for scientific research is 26.1 billion.