Belmonte: House to pass P2.6-T budget next week

House Speaker Sonny Belmonte Jr. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / LEO M. SABANGAN II

MANILA, Philippines—The House of Representatives is ready to pass on third reading next week the proposed P2.606-trillion budget for 2015, with minimal changes.

Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. on Thursday said the lower chamber should approve its version of the budget “by Wednesday next week,” after which it would be submitted to the Senate for its own scrutiny, and then to a bicameral conference.

He said there were no significant amendments to the expenditure program proposed by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM).

“Just more itemization of lump sums and identification of projects,” Belmonte said of the amendments introduced by individual lawmakers. Lump sums, as opposed to line item budgets, refer to allocations that are generally defined.

Avoiding reenacted budget

The House and the Senate are aiming to enact the 2015 expenditure program before Jan. 1, 2015, to avoid a reenacted budget.

Once both chambers finish reviewing the proposed budget law and introducing amendments, they will meet in a bicameral conference to reconcile the two versions of the bill, upon the approval of which both Houses will pass it into law.

Under the proposed 2015 budget, the departments with the biggest allocations are, in order: Department of Education, P365 billion; Department of Public Works and Highways, P300.5 billion; Department of National Defense, P144 billion; Department of the Interior and Local Government, P141.4 billion; Department of Social Welfare and Development, P109 billion; Department of Health, P102.2 billion; Department of Agriculture, P88.8 billion; Department of Transportation and Communications, P59.5 billion; Department of Environment and Natural Resources, P21.3 billion, and the judiciary (Supreme Court), P20.3 billion.

New definition of savings

In proposing the expenditure program, the DBM stirred up controversy after it introduced a new definition of savings in response to a Supreme Court definition striking down the government’s Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP).

Based on this new definition, savings may now be declared upon the “discontinuance or abandonment of a programmed project for a justifiable cause at any time during the validity of appropriation.”

It omits the word “final” before “abandonment” from previous government definitions, meaning the President may declare savings even when a project has not been totally scrapped.

In voiding the DAP, the Supreme Court had struck down the executive branch’s practices of declaring savings from unreleased appropriations and using unprogrammed or standby appropriations.

It ruled that savings and standby appropriations can be declared only at the end of the fiscal year.