Angara: 2022 budget must keep pace with Covid-19 demands

Senator Sonny Angara said he sees the need for more flexibility in the processes involved in the annual submission of the national budget to keep up with the constantly changing demands and situation on the ground during the pandemic.

The chair of the Senate finance committee noted that many of the requirements of the various government agencies and offices are not contained in the copy of the national budget submitted to Congress, particularly those related to the response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

During the Development Budget Coordinating Committee briefing for the Senate on the P5.024 trillion national budget for 2022, the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) noted that there were no provisions for the vaccination of minors, the provision of special risk allowance (SRA) for health workers, and other items related to the government’s response to the Covid-19 variants, including the highly-infectious Delta variant.

“With the emergence of Delta and the other Covid variants, the requirements of our frontline agencies are constantly moving. The situation is changing rapidly and so must our processes pertaining to the submission of the national budget,” Angara said.

The Constitution requires the President to submit to Congress the proposed national budget within 30 days from the opening of its regular session or by the third week of August every year.

“The agencies are required to submit their budget proposals early on so that the DBM will be able to prepare the voluminous document and have it ready for submission to Congress by the third week of August,” Angara said.

“Given this situation, it is understandable that a lot of key expenditures are not captured in the budget document,” he said.

“Agencies should be allowed to submit revisions to their proposed budgets to reflect new developments brought about by the pandemic. The spread of Covid has been rapid and our budget must be able to keep up with it,” the senator added.

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Source: Latest Politics News Today (Politics.com.ph)