SENATORS on Monday sought to allay concerns over a looming scenario that the government will operate under a reenacted national budget in January as members of the two chambers of Congress, set to adjourn in mid-December, are not likely to approve the P3.757-trillion 2019 budget bill before going on holiday break.
“A reenacted budget is not impossible,” Senate President Vicente C. Sotto III admitted to reporters on Monday. “The way the Committee on Finance [tasked to hammer out the final version of the annual money measure] is saying [it], the schedule is that there is need for a reenacted budget, but only for January.”
Sotto said the Senate leadership is leaving it up to “the budget committee and all the senators [to] decide by Wednesday” confirming that the annual money measure, supposed to emanate from the House of Representatives, will still have to be approved by the Senate endorsing panel once the House does transmit it. The latest word was that the House would do so by November 28.
“We should take our time and not rush it,” Sotto said.
Sen. Francis G. Escudero indicated that the delay in the House transmittal of the budget bill could be attributed to the recent “change in [the] House leadership.”
“[It is] impossible to pass the budget within the year,” said Escudero, explaining that “It will take us time to come to a final agreement with the House.”
The senator suggested that the bicameral panel “should meet during the Christmas break and submit a final version [of a reconciled Senate-House version of the 2019 budget bill] when we resume sessions in mid-January.”
Escudero explained further that the final Senate version “has to be based on [the] House committee report…but senators must vote on it before the Christmas recess,” noting that the annual budget bill “is the most important piece of legislation we will be acting upon.”
In a separate interview, Senate Minority Leader Franklin M. Drilon acknowledged that “we cannot finish the budget, which has not even been tackled in a Senate hearing.”
Still, Drilon added: “I don’t think we should lose sleep [if] the budget is not passed in [the] first 15 days of next year. We can approve it in January. To rush it and commit mistakes . . . we will not die, the country will not collapse if we approve it in January.”
The Minority Leader suggested to fellow senators that “e wait until we receive the GAA before we approve it,” referring to the annual General Appropriations Act that the House must first pass. “Next year is an election year, let’s not rush it [and instead] deliberate carefully.”
Asked by Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph G. Recto about the implications of a reenacted budget, Escudero explained that, “insofar as items included in the National Expenditure Program (NEP), they cannot award projects…. The hands of the administration will be tied.”
Sen. Panfilo M. Lacson, explaining the implications of delayed passage of the 2019 budget, noted that “by then, we will have six session days left before Congress adjourns on December 12—eight [days] if we include two Thursdays in our calendar. We are not superheroes in the Senate to finish scrutinizing the House version of the budget bill, including all the study and research prior to plenary debates, amendments, etc.”
Lacson added that once the House approves the money measure on third and final reading, “it takes 10 days, give or take, to print the General Appropriations Bill prior to transmittal to the Senate.
“Having said that, this early, it is not difficult to predict a re-enacted budget in 2019.”
Lacson continued, “And I dare say, it’s all the fault of the Lower House that their insertions also known as pork barrel allocations, which I guess is their main reason for the delay, will not be implemented if the national government operates under a re-enacted budget. It serves them right.”