In June this year, the Parliament created a Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into Rail Baltica, which aims to identify the mistakes made in the implementation of the project, while making it a priority issue for the government.
The cost of the Rail Baltica project has risen to almost €24 billion from under €6 billion initially. The project's cost increase is so vast that only the first phase of the project is planned to be completed by 2030 - essentially a single-track road instead of a double-track, if that. Latest developments foresee using the track in stages before the entire link is even built.
Representatives of the Bank of Latvia and the Financial Discipline Council were invited to the parliamentary inquiry commission. Both institutions have previously expressed concerns in their opinions about various risks associated with the project, such as the increasing cost of construction, the uncertainty of EU funding after 2027 and the need to take into account a significant increase in the share of public funding.
Members of the Commission criticised the Ministry of Finance for not heeding these warnings and expressed concern as to whether the State would be able to cover its contractual obligations towards the builders.
The Ministry of Finance, for its part, rejected the accusations.
"We can certainly call on the Minister of Transport to take concrete steps to put this situation right, but it will not be the Ministry of Finance that will tell the Minister of Transport," said Baiba Bāne, State Secretary of the Ministry of Finance.
The next meeting of the parliamentary commission of inquiry is expected to invite senior officials of the Transport Ministry, after which the commission will start questioning political officials.
