MANILA, Philippines – Senate finance committee chairman Sherwin Gatchalian said on Monday, December 1, that the upper chamber is working on a tight schedule to pass the proposed 2026 national budget and prevent a re-enacted 2025 spending plan.

Speaking to reporters, Gatchalian said the Senate aims to pass its version of the P6.792-trillion spending plan on third and final reading by Tuesday, December 9.

The bicameral conference committee meetings will tentatively start on December 11, after the Senate passes its version of the proposed 2026 national budget.

Gatchalian also said he hopes to have the bicam report signed by December 16, with the target signing of the spending plan into law by December 29. If President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. does not sign the 2026 budget into law by end-December, the current 2025 spending plan will be re-enacted.

As Congress prepares to open the doors to what was once an opaque process, Gatchalian outlined several things that the public can expect from the open bicam.

Livestreamed meetings, public documents

Apart from assuring the public that meetings will be livestreamed, Gatchalian also said they will be uploading all pertinent documents. These include the third reading copy of the proposed budget, as well as committee reports from hearings with budget watchdogs.

Gatchalian said this will ensure that civil society and the public can monitor the changes made to the spending plan.

“So far, nangyayari naman, like for example, nag-upload na tayo ng committee report at merong mga civil society organizations na humingi ng Excel format,” he said.

(We’ve been able to do this so far. For example, we’ve uploaded the committee report and there are civil society organizations who asked for it in Excel format.)

To help the public track movements of budget items, Gatchalian also said that they plan to release a matrix that summarizes these changes and why these modifications were made.

“For example, I believe the House added around P20 billion for classrooms, while we added an additional P10 billion…so the reason why we decided to adopt a certain version — whether it’s the House’s or the Senate’s – will be indicated in there,” Gatchalian explained in Filipino.

Ground rules?

Gatchalian shared that they have yet to finalize the do’s and don’t of the bicam with their counterparts from the House of Representatives. But he did discuss two ground rules with his House counterpart, appropriations chairperson Mika Suansing.

For starters, Gatchalian proposed to no longer include what Senator Ping Lacson described as “alien” programs, which refers to budget insertions that are neither the House nor Senate versions of the proposed budget.

He also hopes to limit the discussion to disagreeing provisions between the two versions of the budget. Gatchalian acknowledged that there may be some lawmakers who wish to push for changes that may not have been granted at the committee or plenary debates.

“So I would suggest, since the Senate committee report and third reading version are uploaded, and the GAB is also uploaded. So we will compare the [House] GAB and the Senate third reading version, and we will only discuss the differences between the two versions,” he said in Filipino.

Among the disagreeing provisions between the budget of the two chambers is the inclusion of unprogrammed funds.

Gatchalian also cited the Strengthening Assistance for Government Infrastructure and Social Programs (SAGIP) as an example. The House retained funding for SAGIP, while the Senate removed its allocations.

Although the Senate version of the budget has slashed funding for patronage projects including unprogrammed appropriations, budget watchdogs believe this could still be reduced further.

“These items, historically prone to misuse due to vague and opaque triggers for release, should be removed,” the Roundtable for Inclusive Development wrote in its November 28 statement.

Suansing earlier argued that the unprogrammed appropriations were necessary to fund foreign-assisted projects that did make the budget preparation deadline. – Rappler.com