COA: House spent P31.5M on legislators’ travels in 2017

Members of the House of Representatives used up P31.5 million in public funds for foreign travels in 2017, documents published by the Commission on Audit (COA) on Tuesday showed.

The disclosure was contained in a listing published by the COA on expenditures of lawmakers in the House from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2017, amounting to about P4.9 billion.

Of the 297 members of the chamber, Taguig Rep. Pia Cayetano spent the largest amount for foreign travels (P864,000) followed by Rep. Sharon Garin (P722,500).

That year, President Rodrigo Duterte expressed disgust over the “excessive travels” of government officials, dismissing a number of officials who, he said, “just went sightseeing.”