MANILA, Philippines?Albay Representative Edcel Lagman on Thursday vowed to rally supporters of the Reproductive Health (RH) bill in the House of Representatives to block deliberation and voting on tax measures and the proposed constitutional convention if the chamber would not tackle the RH bill in the last nine days of session.

Lagman, one of the principal authors of House Bill 5043 on Reproductive Health and Population Development, called on the 132 lawmakers who are co-authors of the bill to "make a daily quorum watch and marshal extensive interpellations on tax measures and the con-con bill," which are among the measures listed as priorities in the remaining session days.

Congress will resume sessions on January 18 and will go on break anew on February 5 to give way to the official campaign period for the May 2010 election.

Speaker Prospero Nograles listed 16 priority measures, including the con-con bill, that would be tackled when session resumes. This did not include the RH bill.

Asked for an explanation, Nograles said, "There are still at least 15 congressmen on deck who want to debate for or against the bill. The time will be consumed and we won?t finish it."

"Our agenda must be realistic on the ground targets," he added in a text message.

Nograles earlier created a panel of debates to expedite discussion of the measure in plenary, but this did not work.

"After (the) initial meeting the panel did not solve (the debate). It made more problems than solutions and they could not agree to the rules of engagement," he said.

Interviewed after the Serye forum in Quezon City, Lagman said he believes some influential members of the Church lobbied Malacanang for Congress to drop the RH bill in its priority list.

But he said it was time Congress discuss and vote on it.

(The RH bill) has ?languished in the legislative mill for more that a decade despite consistent and overwhelming public support for the enactment of a comprehensive reproductive health and family planning law which is rights-based, health-oriented and development-driven," Lagman said.

He said the RH bill was a "quality measure which is definitely not inferior to other pending legislative proposals which have been given priority status."

"No amount of tax laws will shore up the economy if the government continues failing to address the ballooning population which is expected to reach a staggering 94 million Filipinos this year," he said.

The Albay congressman also said that "any constitutional change will only be legalese cosmetic if reproductive health and family planning are not upheld and prioritized as basic human rights of parents and couples."

The RH bill aims to give parents the opportunity to exercise their right to responsibly plan the number and spacing of their children; improve maternal, newborn and child health and nutrition; reduce maternal, infant and child mortality; and lower incidence of abortion by preventing unplanned, mistimed, and unwanted pregnancies.