MPs also receive expenses to cover the costs of running an office, having somewhere to live in Zagreb if they are not permanent residents in  the capital city and travelling between Parliament and their hometown.

For MP’s whose residence is more than 50 kilometres away from Zagreb, the state, for example, covers the costs of rent and utilities in rented flats in the capital, the costs of using personal cars for official purposes, pays them daily allowances for business travel and other expenses, such as hotel accommodation.

All MPs are paid a monthly lump sum of €199, and those who live outside Zagreb are paid a separate living allowance of €133 per month while the parliament is in session, according to the parliament’s data.

Rents make up third of total costs

In the structure of MPs’ costs in 2024, the cost of rents comes first and amounts to €205,600, almost a third of total costs, for the first seven and a half months of the 11th Sabor.

In the whole 2023, when the 10th Sabor was in place, rents accounted for about a fifth of total costs, or €244,500 out of €1,177,500.

The higher cost of rents was influenced by the fact that the parliament, faced with the growth of rents and the announcement by landlords that they would cancel flats for MPs at previously agreed, lower prices, doubled the rental allowance from 1 July 2024 from the previous HRK 2,500, or about €332, to €650 per month.

Last year, the parliament paid rent to private individuals for 67 MPs, and another 27 were accommodated in official flats, for which rent is three times cheaper, but there are not enough of them for the parliament’s needs. The cost of official apartments amounted to €17,900.

The parliament also paid €7,800 in utilities for the flats, and from 1 July, it approved €70 per month for MPs, four euros more than before.

A total of 82 MPs were entitled to a separate living allowance, and a total of €40,400 was paid for this.

More than half of MPs used hotels

In 2023, the costs of using personal cars for official purposes were ranked first, and in 2024 they fell to second place, amounting to €171,000, compared to €409,000 the year before.

In addition, last year, the parliament covered the cost of road tolls for MPs in the total amount of €30,5000.

Third place is held by hotel costs, which amounted to €102,000. Slightly more than half of the MPs, 78 out of 150, used hotels.

Forty of them flew by plane, and €80,800 were paid for their tickets, while MPs were paid almost €21,000 for daily allowances.

Few use public transport

Public transport was not popular with MPs last year, when only 19 of them used this form of transport, two fewer than in 2023, and the cost for the state was a modest €2,250.

This includes HDZ’s Danica Baricevic, Vesna Bedekovic, Josip Boric, Andro Krstulovic Opara, Ivan Malenica, Damir Mandic, Marko Pavic and Jasna Vojnic, SDP’s Arsen Bauk, Irena Dragic, Sasa Djujic, Ivana Markovic and Ivana Majanovic Ribaric, the Homeland Movement’s (DP) Frane Tokic, We Can! MPs Dubravka Novak and Dusica Radojcic, Marijana Puljak (Centre), Predrag Stromar (HNS) and the Bridge party’s Zvonimir Troskot.

However, it should be noted that some of them, such as Djujic, Malenica and Vojnic, used public transport at an almost symbolic level considering the reported cost of €3.32 euros per person.

Highest expenses incurred by Mazar (HDZ) and Zmajlovic (SDP)

Individually, the highest expenses were incurred by HDZ’s Nikola Mazar, €15,720, and SDP’s Mihael Zmajlovic, €15,227. Both are members of the parliament’s delegation to the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly, Zmajlovic as head of the delegation, and Mazar as a member, as well as the Inter-Parliamentary Cooperation Committee, and they are also members of inter-parliamentary friendship groups, Mazar in one, Zmajlovic in nine, and these are duties that entail frequent foreign travel and associated expenses.

Similar duties also affected the expenses of HDZ’s Andro Krstulovic Opara (€12,750) and Danica Baricevic (€12,457) and SDP’s Ivana Markovic (€10,099), who are also MPs from Split and Brac, respectively, which also entails specific, higher expenses.

The expenses of Parliament Speaker Gordan Jandrokovic last year amounted to €7,800, and considering that they only relate to costs of hotel accommodation, planes and daily allowances, it is clear that these are official trips abroad.

Lalovac’s Finance Committee most active

The most active parliamentary committee in 2024 was the Finance and Central Budget Committee. This Committee, led by SDP’s Boris Lalovac, met 19 times, two more than the Legislation Committee, which, as a rule, meets the most because it discusses almost all items that come to the plenary session.

The Petitions and Appeals Committee and the Inter-Parliamentary Cooperation Committee, chaired by Zeljko Jovanovic (SDP) and Kristina Ikic Banicek (SDP) respectively, met the least, once each.