The House and Senate bicameral conference committee on Wednesday approved the proposed P3.002-trillion national budget for 2016 as both chambers are expected to ratify the measure next week.
The chairpersons of the bicameral panel, Senator Loren Legarda, chair of the Senate finance committee, and Davao City Rep. Isidro Ungab, chair of the House committee on appropriations, said this will allow President Benigno Aquino III to sign the bill into law before Christmas.
“By January 1, 2016, there will be a new budget,” Ungab said, adding that this will be the sixth year that the budget passage was done on time.
Ungab said there were four substantial changes, restorations and augmentations in House Bill 6132 that were reflected in the bicameral report—an increase of P1.2 billion in the budget for indigent senior citizens; a P2.7-billion increase in the budget of state universities and colleges; the veterans’ pension totaling P4.7 billion was sustained; and the provision of P7 billion to fully fund the Salary Standardization Law of 2015 for its first tranche of implementation next year.
“In a way, this is our gift to the people as we have introduced allocations and provisions that will benefit those who most need government support,” Legarda said.
For the first time, the national budget includes funding for the payment of the total administrative disability pension for surviving spouses of deceased World War II veterans and partial payment for TAD pension for living post-war veterans who are at least 80 years of age as of 2016.
The budget for the Department of Environment and Natural Resources will also cover, for the first time, capacity building programs for the implementation of the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act which has long been unfunded.
Congress also approved the doubling of the proposed budget for the Office of the Vice President, from P230.5 million to P500 million in 2016.
