• Summary of the Analytical commentary in English PDF (0,2 MB)
• Full text of Analytical commentary in Slovak language PDF (0,6 MB)

• Summary of the Analysis in English PDF (0.2 MB)
• Full Analysis in Slovak language can be found PDF (0.9 MB)

The analysis confirmed that there were significant risks in the process of drug assessment in the period 2017 to 2020 in Slovakia and this process was not optimally set.

• Summary of the Analysis in English PDF (0.2 MB)
• Full Analysis in Slovak language PDF (0.5 MB)

After more than a year since the first confirmed case of a new coronavirus in Slovakia and months of strict anti-pandemic measures, in April 2021 children began to gradually return to schools. Slovakia was one of the countries with the longest (fully or partially) closed schools in the EU, with many pupils not participating in distance/online education. The SAO SR considers mitigating the effects of the pandemic on the education of pupils to be a key challenge, and therefore welcomes the efforts and planned activities of the Ministry, but at the same time identifies space for increasing their scope and targeting. Efforts and resources spent for this purpose may be reimbursed many times over in the future.

• Summary of the Analysis in English PDF (0.3 MB)

Summary

Strategic planning

• At the time of the government’s approval of the F-16 purchase, the basic strategic defence documents had not been updated in the National Council of the Slovak Republic.
• The purchase of 14 F-16 fighter jets exceeds the requirements of the NATO Capability Targets 2017 and drains resources from the implementation of the delayed heavy infantry brigade project.

Eligibility of the purchase

• In Slovakia, the most expensive defence contract since the establishment of the Slovak Republic has not been approved by the Parliament, unlike for example Bulgaria (in the same period for the same type of fighter jets).
• The Ministry of Defence of the Slovak Republic has not proved the eligibility for the purchase of all 14 F-16 C / D Block 70 fighter jets.
• The set target for the total annual number of flight hours is at the level of less than 50% of the purchased capacity.
• The Ministry of Defence of the Slovak Republic has not demonstrated the lower operating costs of the F-16 fighter jets compared to JAS-39 Gripen.
• Some other options were not considered before procurement, such as airspace protection through NATINAMDS or the purchase of the 5^th generation fighter jets.

Funding

• The selected option of tactical airforce renewal may not have been the most effective solution, as value for money was not assessed for all other options.
• If offsets were required during the purchase (for example direct investments in the arms industry, securing subcontracting relations for own arms industry, etc.), the Slovak economy could be supported by an amount up to the purchase price of the fighter jets, i. e. 1.9 billion EUR.
• The total price of operating the F-16 fighter jets for the period from the 3^rd to 10^th year is projected at 720 USD million (excl. VAT). The price is not final.
• The total price for the fighter jets, training, ammunition, two years of operation and the estimated costs for the next eight years of operation of 14 F-16 fighter jets is 2.6 billion EUR (incl. VAT).
• The total cost of procuring F-16 fighter jets and their subsequent operation over 30 years is estimated at 5 billion EUR (incl. VAT) or 6.2 billion EUR over 40 years.

The full text of the analysis about this issue in Slovak language is available here PDF (1 MB).

Summary

• Number of general practitioners for adults (hereinafter “GPs”) per 100 thousands inhabitants in Slovakia is significantly below the EU average. Insufficient number of GPs is a long-lasting problem, which remains unsolved despite a slight increase of the indicator recorded in 2019.   
• Number of general pediatricians per 100 thousands inhabitants in Slovakia is slightly above the EU average. However, while the EU average has been rising during recent years, the indicator for Slovakia has been falling steadily.
• The average age of GPs in Slovakia was 54.1 in 2019. General pediatricians are even older and their average age reached 61.7. The only available source of such indicators is the National Health Information Centre and there are some concerns about validity of data provided by this institution.
• There was a new tool launched in 2014 – named “Residential Programme” (hereinafter “RP”) - aimed at solving the problems with small number and high age of general physicians. The programme was designed as a set of measures that should increase motivation of young medicine doctors to specialize as GP or general pediatrician. As to end of 2019, the total costs of the RP was 22.2 mil. eur; the total number of residents taking part in the programme was 435 and the total number of graduates of the two concerned general specializations was 162.
• The RP generated 135 new young GPs until 2019 which changed the long-lasting downward trend of the total number of GPs into a slight increase last year.
• The RP generated 27 new young general pediatricians until 2019, which stopped the long-lasting downward trend of their total number. However, the impact of the programme in this specialization is small and it hasn’t caused any improvements in the demography of the general pediatricians yet.
• Despite breaking the downward trend of the numbers of GPs and general pediatricians, there hasn’t been sufficient improvement yet, which was the main goal of the RP. Therefore the Supreme Audit Office (hereinafter “SAO”) doesn’t agree with resent decision of the Ministry of Healthcare to include also other specializations into the RP.
• Based on these findings the SAO is planning to audit the RP in 2021. The audit will be focused on the main parameters of the RP as well as finances and contracts within the RP.

The full text of the analysis about this issue in Slovak language PDF (0,64 MB)

Summary

The qualitative and quantitative assessment of the state of justice is not close to the defined national goals of the Slovak Republic or the European averages. Selected indicators of this evaluation are also used in some national projects by the Ministry of Justice of the Slovak Republic. Although the Ministry of Justice of the Slovak Republic implemented reforms in the previous period related to entrepreneurs, i. e. introduced electronic delivery, electronic court file or register of clauses, the quality of these reforms is insufficient for the state and users due to their incompleteness, unavailability or quality of electronic services.

The long-awaited improvement in the services of the Business Register, which was ahead of its time at the time of deployment on the internet, is still being postponed due to the prolongation of public procurement. The set deadlines for the deployment of a new version of the Business Register, the expansion of registrants or the shortening of the registration time in the Business Register were thus not met. Also related to the Business register is the project of registration of end-users of benefits, which disproportionately overwhelmed the departments of the Business Register that were unable to deal with a large number of ideas in this area by the deadline (30 June 2020). For this reason, there was also an extension of the deadlines that the registry courts needed to register companies in the Business Register, even though the law guarantees entrepreneurs registration within two working days. The Ministry of Justice of the Slovak Republic should have evaluated the risks and alternative solutions so that the current situation did not occur.

The electronic services are also affected by the fact that the Ministry of Justice of the Slovak Republic did not evaluate the currently deployed services over time from the point of view of user suitability. In addition, it lacks the personnel capacity to implement the currently planned projects.

The full text of the analysis about this issue in Slovak language PDF (0,58 MB).

Summary

The competent authorities in the Slovak Republic (SR), which are part of the crisis management, including the Administration of State Material Reserves (ASMR), were not sufficiently prepared for the pandemic situation caused by the coronavirus COVID-19. The purchases of ASMR indicate a disproportionate increase of the price of several medical devices (especially surgical drapes/masks, shoe covers, partly protective suits, gloves, goggles). Purchases of selected self-governing regions and cities indicate a disproportionate increase of the price of several medical devices (especially surgical drapes/masks and gloves).

The benchmark of the purchase prices of ASMR was formed by public administration entities, where the purchase of medical devices was expected even before the pandemic (standard health care, law of civil protection, etc.) (In benchmarking, proportionality was maintained by covering western, central and eastern Slovakia. The purchases of three hospitals, three self-governed regions and three regional cities served as the benchmark. Priority was given to processing data from publicly available sources and the possibility to request information in accordance with the Act on the SAO SR was also used.)

Disclosure of the structure and content of orders, contracts and invoices realized from public sources is inhomogeneous in the public administration of the SR, with different levels of information provision. As an example of good practice, the Banská Bystrica self-governed region was identified, which has a set system of publishing and availability of information at a high quality level and even the extraordinary situation did not shake it. On the other hand, the capital of Bratislava published information on only less than 1% (i.e. 5 242 EUR) of purchases from the total amount of 735 000 EUR used for the pandemic-related purchases of medical devices.

At the same time, the analysis revealed several fundamental discrepancies at the level of horizontal and vertical management of public administration. The most important of them complete the comprehensive picture of the protection of health of the population in 2020.

• Functionalities of an efficient, transparent and economical 3D system: availability in the system, disponibility in reserves, and distribution in crisis indicate gaps and inadequacies.
• Inconsistency of information from the website of ASMR and Government Resolution No. 96/2020.
• Government Resolution No. 96/2020 defined individual medical devices in a very general description without further specification.
• The material "Proposal for the creation of emergency reserves" for individual biennials until 2014 also contained the "Overview of the most important threats in terms of the analysis of territory of the SR". There is also a risk of "epidemics and pandemics" in these categories. Since 2015, the threat overview is no longer part of the proposals for the creation of emergency reserves.
• The materials "Proposal for the creation of emergency reserves for individual biennials" since 2008 do not have a uniform processing structure.
• From 2008 to 2020, despite the defined threats to the epidemiological development of pandemiological diseases in the world, the need of creation of crisis management body of the SR to supplement emergency reserves with selected medical devices was not identified.
• In accordance with the Civil Protection Act, medical materials were not continuously updated by individual competent authorities.

In connection with analytical findings, the SAO SR recommends:

• Update and unify the structure of the material "Proposal for the creation of emergency reserves".
• Centrally at the state level to coordinate the database of medical devices within individual subjects of crisis management.
• Check the functionalities of an efficient, transparent and economical 3D system cyclically over time.
• Verify why the reserves of medical devices at individual levels of the state were not sufficient in the intentions of Act No. 42/1994 Coll. on the civil protection of the population and within the scope of the set tasks, management and organization of the civil protection
• Unify and clarify the published information (contracts / orders / invoices) concerning purchases of medical devices from public sources within the public administration, including the resilience of the system during extraordinary events.
• Check the purchases of medical devices in selected self-governed regions and cities in times of emergency.
• Be inspired by the system of Slovak hospitals, which use the institute of ex-ante assessment of the Office for Public Procurement when purchasing (before announcing a public procurement). At the same time, the conditions of the competition, as well as the expected maximum value of the contract (using the benchmark against the prices of past purchases as well as purchases in other countries) are checked at the Ministry of Health of the SR for medicines, medical devices and special medical materials.

The full text of the analysis about this issue in Slovak language PDF (1.2 MB).

Analytical commentary, August 2020 

Summary

Slovakia achieved poor results regarding the quality of textbooks for elementary schools both in TALIS 2013 and TALIS 2018 surveys. This is in line with the findings of various audit and analytical activities done by the Supreme Audit Office of the Slovak Republic (SAO SR). As these activities consistently pointed to the insufficiency of textbooks provision system, the SAO SR decided to analyze it in more detail. The SAO SR prepared a questionnaire and sent it to a statistically representative sample of elementary schools. The survey was conducted during April– May 2020 and facilitated collection of a complex set of quantitative and qualitative data. 

Key findings of the survey:

• More than 3/4 of the addressed schools considered the textbooks for mathematics as unsatisfactory and often unsystematically written.
• Besides mathematics, also textbooks for some other subjects were highly criticized, namely those for Slovak language and literature, informatics and geography.
• Almost 75% of schools are aware of textbooks that are available on market and are of higher quality in comparison to textbooks provided by the Ministry of Education. 
• Due to the poor quality of textbooks provided to schools by the Ministry of Education, majority of schools used other sources to obtain them. Hence, 86% of schools used financial support from parents of pupils to buy textbooks of higher quality.
• The Ministry of Education hasn’t been performing any effective and systematic process of gathering feedback on textbooks – 85% schools has never been asked by any relevant authority about their opinion on textbooks.
• There were also complaints about the portal for textbooks ordering run by the Ministry of Education. Many schools considered it not to be flexible enough. Only 13% of schools agreed with the current system, in which the Ministry of Education selects and distributes textbooks to schools. Over 70% of schools would prefer a system that allows them to choose textbooks freely.
• It also happened that deliveries of textbooks ordered by schools were delayed or did not arrive in the ordered quantity, so that teachers and students did not have them at the beginning of the school year.

In summer 2020, the Ministry of Education changed its approach to the textbooks provision system. The new system will allow schools to choose textbooks from much wider variety of available alternatives since the 2020/2021 school year. It is important to stress that the survey was conducted before this change and thus does not reflect it. The SAO SR welcomes the new approach, but it should have been done much sooner. In addition, the SAO SR recommends ensuring that the delivery of ordered textbooks is on time. If any of ordered textbooks are not going to be delivered, the schools should be informed about this situation as soon as possible.

The full text of the analysis about this issue in Slovak language PDF (0,87 MB).

Analytical commentary, December 2019,

Summary

We chose primary education as the subject of the analysis due to the weaker results of Slovak pupils in comparison with other EU countries. A necessary precondition for increasing the quality of basic education is the growth of the attractiveness of the teaching profession, while several documents point out the low attractiveness of the teaching profession in Slovakia. A well-established remuneration system is important for the growth of the teaching profession attractiveness. We have therefore decided to take a closer look, in particular, at whether teachers in primary schools are sufficiently motivated to perform better through merit in remuneration.

In the period from 2012 to 2018, the share of non-claimable wage components in the total wage of pedagogical employees of primary schools stagnated, resp. decreased slightly (from 10.4% in 2012 to 9.8% in 2018). While the share of rewards stagnated, the share of personal allowance decreased every year. These trends are well illustrated by the changes expressed in absolute numbers - while the average monthly wage has increased by EUR 406.3 (by 50.9%) since 2012; the average monthly amount of the personal allowance has increased by EUR 7 (by 22.3%) over the same period. The level of merit in remuneration varies from region to region. While in the Bratislava region in 2018 the share of remuneration and personal allowance represented on average almost 12% of the total salary of pedagogical employees, in the Trenčín region it was a value of 8.3%.

Almost half of the schools (45.2%) paid on average a lower sum of bonus and personal allowance in 2018 than in the previous year; in 2018, 4.9% of schools did not pay any bonus to their teaching staff and 13% of schools did not pay any personal allowances. We recommend that measures be taken to identify and eliminate the causes of this condition.

In 2018, pedagogical employees of primary schools earned on average 74% of the wages of persons with a university degree. The wages of pedagogical staff in the Bratislava Region lagged significantly behind the average wages in the region (61% of the wages of persons with a university degree). Among other things, this fact is important from the point of view of the additional need for manpower. While in the Bratislava Region schools are already struggling with a shortage of teachers, by 2024 it will be necessary to fill 1 240 additional jobs in the whole region by pedagogical and professional staff and primary school teachers.

In the most regions, the average wage of pedagogical staff lagged behind the average regional wages of women with a university degree only minimally, in the case of men these are much more abysmal differences. In 2018, pedagogical employees in the Bratislava Region earned on average only 50% of the average regional wage of men with a university degree. Even in the case of most of the remaining regions, the values ??were relatively low - from 64% in the Trnava region to 73% in the Banská Bystrica region.

One of the significant limitations in the creation and interpretation of the results of analyses concerning teacher remuneration is the fact that in addition to teachers also school principals, tutors and teaching assistants are included in the group of pedagogical staff. The resulting values are not real values ??for teachers - they are distorted. In addition, for the same reason, the remuneration of school principals or other categories of teaching staff cannot be analysed. For the needs of detailed analyses, we recommend collecting and reporting data separately for all categories of teaching staff.

Another such limitation is the unavailability of data on salary and its components at the level of individual teachers. As a result of working with averaged data for individual schools, we can only estimate the numbers of teachers who are paid below-average salaries, bonuses or personal allowances. We would only be able to reach the actual numbers by working with individual data. For the same reason, it is not possible to assess the extent to which the payment of bonuses and personal allowances is differentiated within individual schools. We also do not know whether school heads award bonuses and personal allowances in a targeted, objective and transparent manner, and whether they are linked to the quality and performance of teachers.

The full text of the analysis about this issue in Slovak language PDF (0,6 MB).

Summary

The aim of these findings and comments is to stimulate a professional and public discussion on the continuation of self-government reform in the Slovak Republic (SR). The initiation of a public discussion about the self-government reform direction in the SR was already recommended in the audit by the Supreme Audit Office of the Slovak Republic (SAO SR), performed in 2014. It assessed the efficiency and effectiveness exercising the powers of 93 municipalities in the SR. In 2019, the SAO SR focused on the functioning of self-government on the example and submissions from the Capital Bratislava (BA). The municipality should provide adequate services for all its inhabitants. We would like to draw special attention to some selected areas due to their societal value.

The key challenges of BA in relation to young families are in particular: (1) weak housing support and (2) insufficient capacity in kindergartens. However, in the area of housing, the goal of building rental apartments for tenants from restituted houses has not been met yet. In kindergartens, the pressure on capacity possibilities is increasing, which will increase in the near future and will subsequently be transferred to primary schools. BA has a disadvantaged position in the SR in obtaining resources to address these challenges from the European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF). According to the ESIF Strategy for the 2014 - 2020 programming period, the Bratislava Region is considered a more developed region; therefore, it can draw funds only to a limited extent. Among other things, additional resource potential can be created by reforming local taxes.

The importance of the BA self-government reform is confirmed by several facts. A BA resident is considered to be a resident of both the city and the city district, but in some cases, he/she cannot directly influence what is happening in the neighbouring district, even if is directly affected by it. Especially if complicated competencies and excessive fragmentation of self-government are also reflected in differences in revenues and expenditures, as well as in the different efficiency of the districts. The highest efficiency of self-governments (within the local territorial self-government in the territory of BA), in the period 2015 to 2017, was achieved by the Districts of Ružinov, Nové Mesto and Podunajské Biskupice. On the other side is Devín District, which has already been under forced administration for 14 years.

The full text of the analysis about this issue in Slovak language PDF (1,27 MB).

Summary

This analytical report is the first comprehensive assessment of the benefits of investment aid in the Slovak Republic (SR). Report´s aim is to provide the public with information on investment aid policy in the SR over the last ten years, to evaluate the ex-post benefits of drawn investment aid for regions and to analyze its sectoral aspect.

The first chapter of the analytical report provides basic information about investment aid policy in terms of strategic documents, legislation and the main actors in investment aid; the second one talks about specific indicators of approved and drawn investment aid in the SR. The aim of the third chapter is to analyze the impact of drawn investment aid on regional indicators and to compare the system of investment aid in the SR with the aid investment policy in the Czech Republic (CR). The result of the analytical report is the fourth chapter, which formulates conclusions and recommends topics for audit activities.

The analytical report is based on data of approved and drawn investment aid for ten years, the period of 2008 - 2017, in which 106 investment plans were approved for 100 recipients of investment aid valued at EUR 658.4 mil and 21 874 new jobs were supposed to be created in Slovakia. Most investment aid went to the Trnava and Košice regions, approved investment aid for western Slovakia and the Bratislava region represented up to 44.5% of the total volume in the SR. As much as 94% of the approved investment aid went to the area of ??industrial production. In their investment plans, investors preferred investment aid in the form of tax relief. There was the dominance of the sector Manufacture of motor vehicles, semi-trailers and trailers, where 24 investment plans were approved for EUR 182.7 mil (27.8% of the total approved investment aid) in the industrial production. On the contrary, in the Scientific Research and Development sector, only 2 investment plans for EUR 1.5 mil were approved (0.2% of the total approved investment aid).

The evaluation of investment aid impact in the regions shows that it is not possible to prove the impact of the amount of drawn investment aid per 1 inhabitant of the SR for 2008 - 2017 and it is not possible to make a conclusion that it reduced regional disparities. The paradox is that, in terms of the amount of regional GDP per capita in PPS (purchasing power standards), the two relatively least developed regions (Banská Bystrica and Prešov) drew the least investment aid per capita. These regions did not reach the level of the SR in the approved investment aid, which indicates weak investment activity in these regions.

In the CR, much more has been approved from the State budget for investment aid. In 2008 – 2017 period, the volume of approved investment aid was 6.4 times higher (EUR 4 191.7 mil in CR, EUR 658.4 mil in SR). The share of investment aid in GDP was almost 2.9 times higher (0.26% in CR, 0.09% in SR), investment aid per capita 3.2 times higher (EUR 39.93 in CR, EUR 12.16 in SR) and investment aid per newly created job 1.7 times higher (EUR 49,675 in CR, EUR 30,098 in SR). In both countries the area of industrial production had more than 90% representation (98% in CR, 94% in SR). The sectoral focus of investment aid was very similar in both countries, with a significant predominance of Motor Vehicle Production (38.05% in CR, 27.8% in SR).

In the strategic document Strategy of the Economic Policy of the Slovak Republic until 2030, in the business environment SWOT analysis is stated that investment aid distorts the natural competitive environment by favoring recipients over their natural competitors, mostly investors included in the category of large companies (93 recipients of investment aid with approved 96.2% of the total approved aid and who drew 95.4% of the total drawn aid).

This analytical report points out that it would be worthwhile consider to re-evaluate the investment aid policy focusing on small and medium-sized enterprises support with emphasis on the least developed districts and it would bring the desired greater diversity in the size structure of companies and the representation of industries in the SR and at the same time naturally will contribute to regional disparities reduction.

The full text of the analysis about this issue in Slovak language ZIP (2 MB).

The topic of research and development has been emphasized both in international and national strategic documents, such as the 2030 UN Agenda, the Programme Statement of the Government of the Slovak Republic, or the national reform programmes for recent years. According to these documents, R&D in the Slovak Republic (SR) represents an area with insufficient results. Among other concerns there are named low expenditures of SR on R&D, declining number of researchers and below-average citations. Hence, the Supreme Audit Office of the Slovak Republic (SAO SR) identified the R&D as one of the top priority and published the analytical study devoted to this topic in October 2018.

The aim of the report is to evaluate the amount of public funds invested in R&D and results of these public investments in 2007 - 2017 period. To achieve this aim, the report contains: comprehensive description of the field and system; international comparisons of several relevant indicators; evaluation of various public sources used for R&D, especially EU funds; assessment of availability of sufficient R&D data in SR.

The report confirmed, that the SR lags behind comparable countries in many indicators. The SR’s expenditure on R&D as percentage of GDP is one of the lowest in the EU. There is also significantly lower proportion of employees working in R&D in SR than in other comparable countries. In 2016 SR had the second lowest value of the number of patents per GDP within EU countries. Similarly, SR achieved the 25^th place in the rank of 28 EU countries based on the success of achieving funds from Horizon 2020, which can be perceived as one of the most comprehensive indicator. However, when assessing the ratio of funds invested and number of outputs, values for SR are above the EU average. This impression of higher efficiency stems mainly from the fact, that the funds invested are very low.

According to the report, there are serious drawbacks in the strategic management of the R&D in the SR. The system is highly fragmented and it lacks sufficient coordination. In the period 2007 - 2017, 14 strategic documents were adopted in Slovakia in the field of R&D, but only half of them were implemented. There was no comprehensive strategic document covering the public policy of R&D in 2018.

In the period 2007 - 2017, approx. 23% of total public expenditure on R&D in SR was financed by the EU Structural Funds, while in 2015 this portion was more than half. However, the process of allocating the funds from the EU is very administratively demanding. Moreover, there is insufficient attention paid to linkage of the funded projects to the long-term priorities of the SR.

In the SR, there are several portals and databases providing data on R&D. However, the existing databases are not sufficiently interconnected and data consistency is not cross-checked. A significant portion of the data is published in a form which enables almost no processing. This report concludes, that there is no information system in SR, providing data on R&D of sufficient detail, processability, and consistency enabling effective management and surveillance of this area.

As a result, the report defined several particular themes for further analyses, or complex audits, that the SAO SR may undertake in the future.

The full text of the analysis about this issue in Slovak language PDF (2,4 MB).