Three government agencies may suffer budget cuts to give way to the implementation of the newly-enacted Republic Act 10931 or the “Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act,” a House official said on Thursday.
Davao City Rep. Karlo Nograles, chairman of the House of Representatives’ committee on appropriations, said the proposed budget of the Department of Information and Communications Technology, Department of Agrarian Reform and the Department of Transportation, respectively, may be slashed due to low absorptive capacity and sluggish implementation of projects and programs.
By reducing budget for next year, the three agencies could contribute P 37.5 billion in total as a standby fund once the free college education program is fully implemented in 114 State Universities and Colleges, 16 Local Universities and Colleges accredited by CHED and 122 Technical-Vocational Institutions under Tesda.
During the budget briefing of the Department of Information and Communications Technology on Thursday, Nograles’ panel discovered the agency has P2.7 billion of unused appropriations in 2016 and P2.695 Billion in unused appropriations in 2017.
“These funds will expire in December 31, 2017 and I doubt very much if DICT will be able to utilize these funds before the year ends. So instead of wasting these funds I would rather use the money to support the higher education law for free tuition and miscellaneous fees for students in SUCs, LUCs, TVIs,” Nograles said.
Nograles said that an additional P 5 billion can be sourced from the DAR and P 30 billion from the DOTr.
“Another department with low utilization rate is the Department of Agrarian Reform that failed to utilize P6 billion in 2015, and failed to obligate P5 billion in 2016.
The Department of Transportation, on the other hand, failed to utilize P33 billion in 2015, and again in 2016 they have so far failed to obligate P30 billion of their budget allocation,” Nograles said.
Nograles said, however, that since some of the unused allocations were programmed under the 2015 appropriations, the funds have already expired and were reverted to the national treasury.
The unused funds for the 2016 appropriations, on the other hand, will expire in December of this year.
While it cannot be tapped for the 2018 national expenditure program, it can be programmed for spending under a supplemental budget.
“The 2016 funds are still alive and set to expire on December 31, 2017. At this point in time I am very doubtful they will be able to utilize those funds. So I am looking at considering these funds as savings and writing a supplemental budget to use as standby fund for the free higher education law,” Nograles said.
Nograles said that on the basis of the spending pattern of DICT, DAR and DOTr, his panel considers them as top candidates for possible budget cuts in their proposed 2018 budget without compromising President Duterte’s “Build Build Build” program.
The DICT has submitted a P6.87 billion budget request for 2018. The DOTr is asking P73.8 billion while the Department of Agrarian reform is seeking Php10.3 billion.
“Based on their spending pattern, we now know where to make the cuts. At least for now, we have a standby source of at least P37.5 Billion which can be made available through supplemental budget in case we still fall short of the needed funds to support the free college education law,” Nograles said.
Meanwhile, the Commission on Higher Education is eyeing an “opt-out” mechanism to exclude some state universities and colleges (SUCs) from fully implementing the president’s new law for free tuition in state-funded schools.
Despite Duterte’s new law for state-run schools to offer free tuition, CHED Commissioner J. Prospero De Vera III said that they are looking at several mechanisms on how can “students coming from richer households can pay for their tuition or at least pay for some portion of the subsidy.”
“We’re looking at different models. We will put a mechanism for opt-out,” De Vera said in a Palace news briefing.
The new provision might be implemented in some state schools with a high percentage of well-off pupils, among them is the University of the Philippines System (UP) to ensure that the implementation of the law remains equitable.
“Word of caution that when you talk of the law, the intention of the law is really to cover the bigger majority of students in the more than a hundred SUCs. And UP is more of the exception, is the exception rather than the rule when you look at the profile of students,” he said.
“Whatever reservations people might have because in UP, students are fighting over parking space ‘no, that’s not the condition in the more than a hundred other SUCs,” he added.
Stricter admission and retention policies are likewise being eyed to ensure that the government can fully subsidize tuition fees — including the implementation of stricter admission tests, ensuring that students will have a full load every semester, among others.
Second degree courses and post-graduate degrees will not be covered by the new law, De Vera added.
“There might be a temptation on the part of some state universities because there’s government subsidy to increase the number of students because they will be receiving additional funding from government.
So we are telling the state universities and colleges that the new free tuition and miscellaneous law should not be used as an excuse to open — to do open admissions,” De Vera said.
“They must retain their existing admission and retention policies and tighten it further by limiting the subsidy, for example, to students who are only in their first undergraduate degree — meaning second degrees will not be covered; make sure that students enroll full load,” he added.
“Students who fail to complete the required number of units will lose their subsidy for that semester or maybe that year and once they go back and retain their being a student of good standing, then they receive subsidy from government again.”
It will also be in the discretion of the SUCs or local universities and colleges (LUCs) if they would implement a Return Service Agreement as part of their admission and retention policies, De Vera adds.
A teachers’ groups meanwhile, asked lawmakers to re-channel intelligence and war funds to CHED’s budget to cover the funding requirements for the new bill.
“We urge our lawmakers to re-channel intelligence, confidential and extra ordinary funds of all government agencies for free public college education. In the proposed 2018 National Budget, the amount allocated for intelligence, confidential and extra ordinary expenses amount to 7.3 billion already – funds that are not even audited. This amount is almost half of the 16 billion needed for the full implementation of the free public college education,” said Raymond Basilio, secretary-general of the Alliance of Concerned Teachers.
Militant lawmakers meanwhile, questioned the continued underfunding and budget cuts in state-run schools, after budget cuts were observed in 43 SUCs.
“Despite the increase in budget from P58.9 billion to P61.4 billion, 43 SUCs are set to incur net budget decreases for 2018. 23 SUCs will suffer cuts in their Personal Service (PS) budget, while 50 will have cuts in their Maintenance and Operating Expenses (MOOE) budget and 49 have cuts in their Capital Outlay (CO) budget. In fact, the Philippine State College of Aeronautics has zero budget for CO for 2018,” Kabataan Partylist Rep. Sarah Elago said.
The youth solon also questioned how SUCs are expected to keep earning internal income, estimated to be at P44 billion.
According to the 2018 Budget of Expenditures and Sources of Financing, the DBM expects SUCs to earn P44.7 billion from their internal income for 2018. P13.2 billion is expected to come from tuition collection.