MANILA, Philippines -- The leaders of Congress defended legislators’ travel abroad, often denigrated as “junkets,” saying these trips are, costs aside, an essential part of lawmaking.

“There is always negative commentary whenever members of the Congress go on official mission abroad. They are often criticized. But it is important for us to gather fresh ideas and learn from experiences especially of other countries that are far more advanced in the Philippines,” Senate President Manuel Villar said in remarks at the launching of Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Pimentel Jr.’s book, “Junketing: Senatorial Style,” Thursday.

House Speaker Prospero Nograles, in a separate statement, said that, contrary to the perception that lawmakers are just wasting public money when they go abroad, they maximize the “beneficial use of these trips, expensive as they are,” by informing the public about what they have done and achieved from these activities.

All these, they said, are apart from the chance to foster friendship and mutual cooperation with their counterparts in other countries.

While his book defends the importance of legislators’ foreign trips, Pimentel, in his own remarks, acknowledged that these can be “abused when the legislator concerned simply goes abroad and uses the occasion and conferences supposed to be attended as an excuse for going on a junket at the expense of the public till.”

Representative Cuenco, chair of the House committee on foreign affairs, in a statement, proposed that both chambers adopt a joint resolution requiring all their members who go on official travel to submit, upon returning to the country, a comprehensive report of their activities and the results of their mission.