MANILA, Philippines — Sen. Panfilo Lacson yesterday proposed that the Senate simply adopt the House of Representatives’ version of the P4.1-trillion national budget for 2020 after he found no ”pork” in the money measure.
Lacson made the suggestion as Congress resumes session tomorrow with the Senate focusing its attention on the proposed General Appropriations Bill (GAB) so that President Duterte could sign it before the end of the year.
The senator said he was sure the initial pass his staff made on the GAB that the House forwarded to the Senate last month indicated that only P9.5 billion worth of realignments have been made by the former, and all were institutional amendments or changes made by the chamber as a whole, and not by individual congressmen.
“In fairness to the present House of Representatives, we have the most behaved counterparts because when they announced they only moved P9.5 billion, it was (as) they announced,” Lacson told dzBB.
Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano had earlier listed the realignments that the House made to the National Expenditure Program – what the proposed budget is called when submitted by Malacañang – including P3.5 billion for the Department of Agriculture’s palay procurement fund, increasing it to P10.5 billion; P1 billion each for the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the Philippine National Police; P800 million for the Department of Education; and P500 million each for the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Philippine General Hospital, National Electrification Administration, Metropolitan Manila Development Authority and Philippine Sports Commission.
Lacson, however, said he found some “unclear” provisions totaling P20 billion, some in the items for the Departments of Public Works and Highways, and the Interior and Local Government.
He expects the same to have acceptable clarifications or corrections from the two agencies.
The senator however, said it was still possible that unscrupulous lawmakers will make their pork insertions once the bicameral conference committee, composed of delegates from the Senate and the House – convenes to reconcile conflicting provisions of their respective versions of the GAB.
While there is nothing wrong in making amendments to the GAB, he said congressmen should have already made the changes before the House approved the bill.
He said it would be better if House members would announce the possible amendments they would make before the bicameral conference committee convenes “in the spirit of transparency.”
Better still, Lacson said, is if the Senate simply adopts the House version of the GAB thus obviating the need to convene the bicameral conference committee.
“If that (Senate adopting House version) happens, those holding their amendments for the bicameral conference committee will be open-mouthed… anyway we didn’t see any pork there. I just have to convince my colleagues,” Lacson said.