DBM warned on removal of personal services savings

MANILA, Philippines – Senate President Pro Tempore Franklin Drilon warned the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) yesterday that its decision to remove savings derived from personal services (PS) from the list of funds that could be realigned by the heads of constitutional offices would violate the Constitution.

During a briefing of the Development Budget Coordination Committee (DBCC) at the Senate, Drilon strongly advised DBM Secretary Benjamin Diokno to rethink his position on the issue. 

A provision in the proposed P3.35-trillion national budget bill submitted by Malacañang to Congress provides a list of sources of savings that applies to all government agencies without the PS or salaries paid by an agency to its officials and employees.

Drilon explained savings could be sourced from final discontinuance or abandonment of a project, efficiency measures, non-commencement of a project, procurement service issues and unused PS.

“In the 2017 budget PS disappeared (from the list), therefore you cannot use unused personal services to augment other items in your budget,” Drilon said.

“That’s totally unconstitutional because you are depriving, even the president, if you are to deprive your president that’s fine but do not include the chief justice of the Supreme Court, don’t include the Senate president, etcetera,” he added.

But according to Diokno, any savings derived from PS should revert to the national treasury and that this rule “governs the entire republic and applies to all.”

Article 6, Section 25 of the Constitution states that, “No law shall be passed authorizing any transfer of appropriations; however, the President, the President of the Senate, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and the heads of Constitutional Commissions may, by law, be authorized to augment any item in the general appropriations law for their respective offices from savings in other items of their respective appropriations.”