THE bicameral conference committee on Wednesday approved the proposed P2.606-trillion national budget for 2015, with total realignments amounting to P72.542 billion.
It took only a little over five minutes for the bicameral members to adopt the committee report, which will be sent back to the House and the Senate for ratification before it will be submitted to Malacañang for signature of President Aquino.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Francis Escudero said the bicam panel did not reduce the ceiling but realigned P72.542 billion, a big chunk of it came from the unprogrammed funds within agencies.
He said the bicam panel also agreed to not restore the P53.9 billion for the buyout of the Metro Rail Transit (MRT) Line 3.
“What was restored for MRT 3 is payment for the remaining 15-percent outstanding bonds, which is approximately P4 billion and P6.6 billion for tax in connection with BOT [build-operate-transfer] contract,” Escudero told the Senate media after the bicam meeting.
He said a big part of the P53.9 billion has been realigned to rehabilitation fund of the calamity-hit areas, and also for rehabilitation of MRT 3, amounting to P5 billion.
Escudero said the bicameral committee also removed the P8 billion allotted by the Department of Budget and Management for the Bangsamoro entity.
“If the Bangsamoro basic law will be approved, there will be a Bangsamoro transition commission which will handle the ARMM [Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao] fund amounting to P24 billion. That’s enough [for Bangsamoro],” Escudero said.
The Senate finance panel chief said the bicam committee also adopted almost all of the Senate definition on savings in accordance with the Supreme Court decision declaring some provisions of the Disbursement Acceleration Program illegal.
“Almost all. They cannot declare savings if the projects did not push through because of their own faults,” Escudero explained.
The bicam, according to Escudero, also approved the P2-billion contingency fund for the Office of the President and P14-billion allocation for the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management, formerly named Calamity Fund.
Escudero said P1 billion each for the Quick Response Fund of the departments of Social Welfare and Development, Health, Public Works, and Science and Technology for relief and rehabilitation.
“Actually, the P1 billion is not enough. For the airport of Tacloban alone, if it will be repaired, that [P1 billion] is not enough,” he said.
The Department of Education will get the largest budget next year, amounting to P323.56 billion, followed by the DPWH, with P292.57 billion; DSWD, with P109.34 billion; Department of the Interior and Local Government, with P104.57 billion; and the Department of National Defense, with P99.92 billion.
Escudero said the Senate might ratify the bicam report during its Wednesday afternoon session.
Early transmittal
Malacañang expects early transmittal of the Congress-approved final version of the P2.606-trillion national budget for 2015 before lawmakers go on their Christmas vacation next week, so President Aquino could sign the annual money measure into law before year-end.
“We look forward to the final steps of getting the approved budget bill from the bicam to the President’s table,” Deputy Spokesman Abigail Valte said on Wednesday, referring to the final version adopted by a bicameral committee that reconciled conflicting provisions in the budget bills separately passed by the Senate and the House earlier.
“We’d like to thank our fellow workers in Congress and in the Senate for devoting their time and attention to the crafting of the national budget,” Valte said.
She noted that the budget debates in both chambers “have been very vigorous” but reports said it took the Senate-House conference committee no more than five minutes to agree and adopt the bicameral panel’s final version of the 2015 budget.
“Both sides have been called to produce the numbers, to produce the basis for our submissions, and we thank them for that,” Valte said.
The Palace official acknowledged that Executive officials defending their respective department’s budget proposals before the lawmakers “always go through a very rigorous process of deliberations when it comes to the national budget.”
Valte, however, declined to go into details of the approved 2015 budget, saying she would defer to Budget Secretary Florencio B. Abad, who, she said, is “entirely more knowledgeable about the submissions to Congress.”
With Butch Fernandez