Recto wants creation of booklet to monitor progress of gov’t promises

Sen. Ralph Recto. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO/GRIG C. MONTEGRANDE

Sen. Ralph Recto on Saturday pushed for the creation of a booklet that would compile the performance targets of government agencies to monitor their promises included in the national budget.

Named “Booklet of Service Speed” or “Booklet of Service Standards,” Recto said these performance indicators were included in the national budget and part of reforms which link funds given to an agency to a set of promised outcomes.

Recto said the thin, pocket-size booklet would contain processing time for applied documents like licenses, response time from law enforcers like the police and firemen, and completion period for services asked.

“Sa ngayon kasi every peso is matched with performance. Kaya doon sa mga requests ng mga ahensya, sinasabi nila na kapag ganito ang pondong ibinigay ninyo sa amin, ito ang mabilis na serbisyo na kapalit,” Recto said.

(Because now every peso is matched with performance. The agencies say that if you give us this amount of fund, this is the quickest service that we will deliver.)

Among the “performance guarantees” embedded in next year’s national budget are “the maximum seven-minute response time of firemen to all distress calls and the PNP vow to respond within 15 minutes to all calls for assistance.”

Recto said the Bureau of Immigration has promised “a gone in 40 seconds rule” in Immigration exit and entry queues.

Meanwhile, the Department of Transportation has promised the following: A 20-percent reduction in airline travel time delays; average of 40 kilometer-per-hour speed of Metro Rail Transit-3 trains; and 90 percent of drivers’ license application will be renewed within one hour.

The Department of Health has vowed to treat more than 90 percent of tuberculosis cases, while the Department of Public Works and Highways has promised to pave 1,592 kilometers of new roads and repair 1,504 existing ones.

For the Department of Environmental and Natural Resources (DENR), its goal is to plant 197 million seedlings in 201,852 hectares of new tree plantations.

Recto said the DENR should not only guarantee it will achieve this, “but provide proof to senators that billions of trees have been planted in more than one million hectares since 2010.” /jpv