The Department of Budget and Management on Saturday backed a proposal to livestream all congressional budget deliberations to promote transparency and public engagement.
“I support the proposal to livestream and make all budget deliberations in Congress and the Senate, including the bicameral conference committee proceedings, more accessible to the public,” Budget Secretary Amenah Pangandaman said during the Quezon Educators’ Research Convention in Lucena City.
“This way, transparency will be strengthened and every Filipino will be able to participate more actively in monitoring our national budget,” she added.
She underscored President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s strong appeal to lawmakers not to deviate from the 2026 National Expenditure Program.
“This is the President’s budget. It may change (but only) slightly, depending on the deliberations in Congress,” Pangandaman said.
The NEP serves as the basis of Congress in crafting the General Appropriations Bill, which becomes the General Appropriations Act once signed into law by the President.
Education (P928.5 billion), public works (P881.3 billion), and health (P320.5 billion) remained the top sectors to receive the biggest allocations under the proposed NEP for 2026, the same ranking as this year’s budget.
The proposed national budget for next year is 7.4 percent higher than the enacted 2025 budget.
The 2026 NEP, the Budget department said, aims to sustain the country’s economic growth momentum while strengthening commitment to nurturing “future-ready generations toward achieving the full potential of the nation.”
On Wednesday, senators unanimously adopted a resolution seeking to institutionalize transparency and accountability mechanisms in the national budget process.
Senator Sherwin Gatchalian, chairperson of the Senate Committee on Finance and sponsor of the measure, said Senate Concurrent Resolution No. 4 (SCR 4) aims to usher in a “golden age of transparency” by ensuring that the public can access and analyze budget documents at every stage of the appropriations process.
Under the measure, the Senate and House of Representatives will upload on their respective websites documents such as the General Appropriations Bill (GAB), committee reports, bicameral reports, transcripts of budget briefings and hearings, and plenary deliberation records.
These documents must also be provided in machine-readable and searchable formats to enable effective public analysis.
The resolution also establishes an online platform where the public can submit suggestions, analysis, or criticism of the national budget.
At the House of Representatives, Speaker Martin Romualdez said they would implement at least five reforms in the enactment of next year’s annual budget and its execution.
“A budget is not just a spending plan—it is a mirror of our priorities and a measure of our accountability to the people. And because this is the people’s money, the process of crafting it must be transparent, inclusive, and worthy of public trust,” Romualdez told his colleagues and DBM officials during the turnover of the NEP.
Romualdez said the House will also invite civil society, people’s organizations, and the private sector to join budget hearings while strengthening the Lower Chamber’s oversight function in the execution of the budget, including requiring timely reports from agencies and real-time tracking of major projects.
Ilocos Norte Rep. Ferdinand Alexander Marcos also vowed to block the passage of any money measure that is far from the proposal submitted by the Palace.
“I will not allow a budget on the floor to pass that is a mutation of the NEP or that [has] become too far off from the NEP. As majority leader I won’t allow that,” said Rep. Marcos.
