Reduced pork agitates House

The House protest against the Malacañang-proposed cash-based system for the 2019 budget has a lot to do with reduced funds for legislators’ individual pet projects which by nature is the illegal “pork barrel.”

This is the theory of Sen. Panfilo Lacson who has consistently questioned the inclusion of “pork barrel” and other forms of insertion in the national budget.

“The cash-based budgeting has an effect to (legislators’) individual pet projects,” Lacson said.

“They said there were budget cuts, so I can only make a guess because under cash-based, isn’t it that projects are subdivided, in which funds will be provided only to accomplish project implementation within the fiscal year. So they cannot get huge appropriations for their districts,” he added.

“When you say appropriation for district, my interpretation is always PDAF (Priority Development Assistance Fund or pork barrel),” Lacson added.

In 2013, the Supreme Court (SC) declared PDAF and other forms of congressional insertions as unconstitutional.

The SC ruled that “all legal provisions of past and present Congressional Pork Barrel laws, such as the previous PDAF and Countrywide Development Fund articles and the various congressional insertions which authorize/d legislators-whether individually or collectively organized into committees ‘to intervene, assume or participate in any of the various post-enactment stages of the budget execution.’”

Since the SC decision in 2013, Lacson said House members have resorted to insertions in the national budget which he said have been rising in recent years.

He cited the insertions of funds ranging from P10 million up to P100 million for road projects with right of way under the Department of Public Works and Highways – which sometimes run up to 45 items.

In most cases, Lacson said, such funds actually end up as “pork barrel” for the lawmaker since the projects, if not non-existent, cannot actually proceed as the right of way could not be settled.

House leaders have sought the recall of the Malacañang-proposed P3.757 trillion national expenditure measure from the Senate in protest of the cash-based budgeting system pushed by the Department of Budget and Management.