Unprogrammed appropriations and the quiet erosion of budget discipline

In public finance, control of the budget is control of policy. This is why the Constitution vests the power of appropriation exclusively in Congress. It is not a procedural technicality but the Legislature’s primary check on executive power and the foundation of fiscal accountability in a presidential system.

Yet this constitutional design is increasingly strained by the growing reliance on Unprogrammed Appropriations (UA) in the General Appropriations Act (GAA). In 2016, UA only had an allocation of P67.5 billion. In 2023, this ballooned to P807.2 billion, then to P724.4 billion and P363.2 billion in 2024 and 2025, respectively. Often defended as a tool for flexibility, UA in fact raises deeper concerns about budget discipline, institutional balance, and fiscal credibility.

The earliest time of a recorded debate on the UA was in the enactment of the 1989 General Appropriations Act (GAA). The proponents early on justified the UA as a tool for management — for efficiency and convenience: you do not have to go back to Congress every time you have extra or new money to spend on programs that the prior year’s and current budget could not fund. The Executive itself could just be authorized by the GAA to identify the specific public purpose and allocate the needed funding.

The unprecedented abuse of the UA the past three years is an eloquent example of the dire consequences of weakening the safeguards and creating opportunities for personal financial and political gain.

An appropriation is not simply permission to spend. Constitutionally, it requires Congress to decide — at the time the budget is enacted — two essential things: what specific public purposes will be funded and how much will be spent. These decisions reflect prioritization and trade-offs that belong exclusively to the Legislature. The Executive’s role begins only after these parameters are set, in the implementation of the budget.

The abuse of UA departs from this sequence.

Under UA, Congress approves spending authority without fully determining its final allocation. Releases depend on future fiscal developments — such as excess or new sources of revenues or loan proceeds — but the choice of which programs, projects, or activities will be funded and in what amounts is deferred until after enactment, and made by the Executive.

From a fiscal management perspective, this effectively creates a two-stage budget process: one approved by Congress with unresolved allocations, and another completed by the Executive during budget execution. This is not merely a legal concern. It affects transparency, predictability, and the credibility of the budget as a fiscal plan.

First, the current abusive practice weakens budget transparency. At the time the GAA is passed, neither the legislators nor the public can clearly identify which UA items will ultimately be funded or the opportunity costs involved.

Second, institutional accountability is blurred. Decisions that should be debated and owned by Congress are shifted to post-enactment executive discretion, making it harder to trace responsibility for spending outcomes.

Third, budget discipline is diluted. The Constitution already provides a clear mechanism for new or additional spending needs: a supplemental appropriation law, which requires renewed legislative approval and public justification. UA function, in effect, as a standing substitute for this process.

The past three years took the turn for the worse when a select small group of legislators, likely with the acquiescence of or in collusion with high executive officials, exploited this device to transfer de-funded priority projects in the General Appropriation Bill (GAB) to the UAs during Bicameral Conference Committee meetings and diverted their funding to pork and patronage projects. This instantly bloated the UA like never before. (During the deliberations on the 2026 budget, the leaders of both chambers committed to end this irregularity).

Supporters of UA argue that, without the anomalous diversion of priority funds by the legislators, it promotes efficiency and flexibility. But constitutional design deliberately prioritizes accountability over speed. Flexibility in implementation is permissible. Flexibility in deciding what to spend on and how much to spend is not.

If allowed to expand unchecked, Unprogrammed Appropriations risk turning Congress’s power of the purse into a formality, while granting the Executive increasing latitude to reshape spending priorities after the budget has been enacted. Over time, this alters the constitutional balance not through amendment, but through practice.

The Supreme Court of the Philippines has previously intervened when budgetary mechanisms threatened constitutional structure and fiscal accountability. Remember the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) and Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) cases? Clarification is again warranted.

An appropriation that leaves the final choice of purpose and amount to post-enactment discretion is, constitutionally and fiscally, no appropriation at all. Restoring discipline over Unprogrammed Appropriations would strengthen — not weaken — public finance, institutional balance and democratic accountability.

Florencio “Butch” Abad was vice-chair and chair of the House Committee on Appropriations from 1995 to 2004, and Secretary of Budget and Management from 2010 to 2016.