The House of Representatives started the plenary deliberations of the 2019 national budget yesterday after being postponed for two days. For the next fiscal year, the Executive proposes a P3.757-trillion cash-based appropriations. This is the third budget of the Duterte administration and the first cash-based appropriations of the Philippine government as we shifted our budgeting scheme from obligations-based to cash-based.
Approving the national budget is not an easy task for us lawmakers. It has to go through scrutiny of several congressmen during the Committee deliberations and it goes through a tougher debate on the floor. The plenary budget deliberations is a chance for us, most especially for me, as the Minority Leader, to interpellate the sponsors of the budget of government agencies to ensure that their respective budgets truly reflect projects and programs for the Filipino people. However, the challenge in approving the national budget is trusting that the government agencies will spend their respective budgets efficiently.
As I speak about efficiency, let us take a look at how the government agencies have performed in the previous years with respect to their budget utilization. From 2011 to 2016, our government had an estimated average of over P350-billion unused appropriations annually. This amount was initially appropriated but not spent by the government agencies due to delays and discontinuation of implementation of several projects and programs. Given this track record of government underspending, I am deeply concerned that the P3.757-trillion proposed budget for 2019 would be underutilized, yet again.
It came as no surprise to us that government agencies continued to underspend under the new administration. In 2017, most government agencies remained to have low absorptive capacities. The Department of Education and the Department of Public Works and Highways had the highest allocations, yet they also had the highest underspending. DepEd had P57.6-billion unused appropriations, while DPWH had P114.5-billion unused appropriations. Other big agencies with unused appropriations were the Department of Tourism (P30.8 billion), Department of National Defense (P23.5 billion), Department of Social Welfare and Development (P23 billion), and the Department of Health (P16.2 billion). In total, these agencies underspent in the amount of P265.6 billion. We must note that underspending in these agencies reflects poorly on the administration, who is supposed to be effecting urgent funding and implementation of much-needed government projects and programs.
I have been consistent about my stand against inexplicable underspending and low absorptive capacity of government agencies. To me, failure to spend the budget efficiently means depriving the people with the basic goods and services from the government. As the Minority Leader, I will take advantage of my role in the plenary budget deliberations to scrutinize the budget with a keen eye on the spending habits of several government agencies. If this is truly a budget for the Filipino people, then it has to be spent efficiently and exclusively for the Filipino people.