Senate won’t rush approval of P4.1-T 2020 budget bill

MANILA, Philippines — The Senate feels no pressure to rush the approval of the P4.1-trillion 2020 budget bill and would continue to closely scrutinize the measure before approving it, according to Senate President Vicente Sotto III.

The House of Representatives approved its version of the bill on third and final reading on Sept. 20, just a month after the executive department submitted its national expenditure plan to Congress.

In a radio interview, Sotto said the Senate’s committee hearings on the measure were ongoing, but plenary deliberations were likely to begin in November and the final approval would be at the end of the month.

Bicameral deliberations could be held by the first week of December at the latest.

Congress is set to go on a monthlong break in the first week of October.

Sotto said the House’s early submission of the budget bill to the Senate would allow the Senate more time to look over the spending plan.

“It will just give us a better timetable and more elbow room,” he said on dwIZ.

The Senate would not do a hasty job, he said.

“I don’t remember the Senate ever doing a fast break [on the budget bill],” he said.