Minister nominee Lee Hye-hoon for the Ministry of Planning and Budget said on the 6th that "the reason the ministry exists is to take responsibility for solving the tough challenges of fiscal innovation, such as streamlining similar and overlapping programs and restructuring mandatory and rigid expenditure."
At a roundtable with fiscal policy experts that day, the nominee said, "For public finance to fulfill its proper role, strong expenditure efficiency measures that eliminate duplication and block leakages to secure maximum fiscal room must be the premise," and stated accordingly.
Attending the roundtable were Inha University professor Kang Byung-gu, Myongji University professor Woo Seok-jin, Konkuk University professor Yoon Dong-yeol, Korea Fiscal Policy Institute President Kim Jeong-hoon, Korea Institute of Public Finance(KIPF) senior research fellow Kim Hyun-a, and Korea Development Institute (KDI) senior research fellow Lee Tae-seok.
They said, "To ease hardships in people's livelihoods, public finance needs to play a more active role," and suggested, "Through efficiency in mandatory expenditure and reprioritization of spending, inefficient expenditure must be strictly managed."
In response, the nominee said, "External and internal conditions are unprecedentedly grave," adding, "This is the time for public finance to actively serve as a pump-priming force to solidify the recovery, lift the potential growth rate, and ease polarization."
Lee said, "My consistent conviction is that public finance must faithfully play its role when needed," and added, "I will take the responsible 'implementation of active fiscal policy'—which secures both the productivity and sustainability of fiscal investment—as my final calling as a public servant."