Escudero scrutinizes budget errata, seeks specific details on corrections

MANILA, Philippines—The “errata” or the last-minute changes that the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) has made to the proposed national budget next year amounted to P43.64 billion, Senator Francis “Chiz” Escudero said on Tuesday.

Escudero, chairman of the Senate committee on finance, said the P43.64 billion errata was different from the P4.7 billion figure of the House of Representatives, which only computed the increase submitted by the executive.

Unlike the House, the senator said, his committee also computed the realignments made within an agency.

“Kami kinompute namin lahat ng galaw,” he said during a press conference at the Senate.

Sen. Francis Escudero. FILE PHOTO

Under the package of amendments submitted by the DBM, Escudero said, the following will get additional funds: Contingent Fund (P8B), Department of Social Welfare and Development (P7.9 billion), Department of Transportation and Communications (P7.7B), Department of Health (P4.2B), International Commitment Fund (ICF) (P3.2B), Department of Finance (P1.6B), Commission on Audit (P1.1B), Miscellaneous Personnel Benefits Fund (P1.1B), and Pension and Gratuity Fund (P6.8B).

And since the Senate was not given a copy of the errata or was not even informed about it while it was deliberating the 2015 national budget, the senator said he would ask the DBM and each government agency receiving additional funds to provide the “specific details as to why and where and when corrections were made.”

“Of course we will get down to the specifics of the errata since this has not been discussed during the budget deliberation. We were not made aware of the corrections and we are interested to know from where to where are these funds moving,” he said in a separate statement.

Escudero said his committee is now reviewing the errata and getting its details before the proposed National Expenditure Program goes to the Senate plenary next week.

“When we go to the plenary next week, other senators can take this up. We may not agree with the House version because our version may be different, but we will act accordingly towards the general direction of the Senate budget,” he said.

Escudero said the Senate panel has already seen items in the errata, which will not be accepted and adopted in the Senate version.

“The committee is open to any and all questions regarding the errata and any item in the budget proposal. There will be specific items that we will remove in the errata. By Monday next week, we would have finalized all proposed amendments from the sub and mother committees for committee report and once referred, by Tuesday we expect to deliver the sponsorship speech,” he said.

He said the lower house also made its own errata amounting to P19.8 billion but said it was only .7 percent of the proposed 2015 budget.