supporting national strategies for safe and sustainable pensions through an integrated approach, COM (2001) 362 final, July 2001). 31.1. The Applications repeatedly emphasise that the accruals of the social insurance special budget have been spent unreasonably, and this expenditure was one of the reasons for adopting the impugned provisions. The Ministry of Finance and the State Treasury in their replies to the Constitutional Court purport that disposing of the social insurance special budget accruals took place in conformity with the Law on Budget and Financial Management. One of the fundamental principles of social insurance – self-financing – has been worked into the legal acts regulating this area. The social insurance special budget is built up solely by the social insurance contributions, and the outlays from this budget are intended solely for social insurance services. It means that a certain balance between the revenues and outlays of this budget has to be maintained. Imposition of unreasonable additional expenditures can unsettle this balance, thus endangering the financial sustainability of this budget. 31.1.1. One can see from the Case materials that 951.1 million lats have been accrued in the social insurance special budget at the beginning of 2009, whereas by 1 September 2009 this accrual has decreased to 845.4 million lats. Thus, the accrual of the social insurance special budget has decreased for more than 100 million lats within a period of eight months. The surplus in the social insurance budget from contributions made during the years of economic growth and favourable demographic situation is accrued to the social insurance accounts. Although mutual borrowing among budgets took place already in 1999, and a possibility to use the social insurance budget reserves for deriving profit was discussed already in 2005, only on 2 December 2009 the Cabinet of Ministers decided to support the investment of the social insurance special budget accrual funds into the State Treasury (see Case materials, vol. 9, pp. 187f, and the Conception of the Cabinet of Ministers “On management of State social insurance financial resources until 2012” of 3 December 2008, Latvijas Vestnesis, 5 December 2008, No. 190). The surplus of the social insurance special budget is the reserve fund. In accordance with the effective regulatory enactments, it can be used solely for the disbursement of social insurance allowances and pensions in the cases when the revenues of the social 58