Gov’t needs P155B to fund proposed Uplift law
The Marcos administration will need at least P155 billion to fund the programs and projects, including the possible expansion of subsidies for the middle class, to address the energy and price shocks caused by the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.
The amount is based on an estimate given by the Office of the Executive Secretary for the proposed Unified Package for Livelihoods, Industry, Food, and Transport (Uplift) law, which President Marcos said will be an urgent measure to help Filipinos reeling in the soaring prices of fuel and basic goods.
“[T]his figure is not fixed. In public financial management terms, this remains a dynamic and evolving funding envelope as the final amount will depend on how much the participating agencies can realign, repurpose, or defer from their existing appropriations in order to support targeted interventions addressing the Middle East crisis,” Budget Undersecretary Goddes Hope Libiran said in a briefing in Malacañang on Thursday.
“In other words, we are not looking at entirely new spending, but rather a strategic reprioritization within the current fiscal phase consistent [with] prudent fiscal management and in line with our whole-of-government efforts,” she added.
The funding requirement would still undergo “further refinements” as agencies finalize their respective proposals in the upcoming interagency meetings.
According to Libiran, funding for the items under the Uplift law would not be from supplemental budget but from savings from programs, activities and projects (PAPs) that agencies “may be willing to give up or be deprioritized.”
Timely measure
Last March, Mr. Marcos signed Executive Order No. 110 declaring a state of national energy emergency and authorizing the Uplift program providing subsidies to vulnerable sectors and industries.
During the fifth interagency Uplift committee meeting on Tuesday, Cabinet members discussed the proposal to file a bill institutionalizing the program.
According to Palace press officer Claire Castro, the legislation was considered a “priority” and “urgent” measure by the President.
While Malacañang gave no deadline for Congress, the President expects the enrolled bill to be on his table for his signature “soon,” because “this is a timely measure.”
The 20th Congress is currently adjourned and will resume session on May 4.
The proposed Uplift law aims to provide a list of PAPs that may be funded from allocated budgets.
These include another round of subsidies for workers of the transport and agricultural sectors, and assistance to members of the middle class, and additional funding for the expansion of the service contracting program and fuel subsidy program for public utility vehicles.
It also aims to clear legal impediments for the executive to tap into its savings.
The proposed law shall remove the two-year prohibition on including in the proposed budget any items declared as savings.
It also seeks to give the government the authority to utilize unreleased appropriations and unobligated allotments from the 2025 General Appropriations Act (GAA), as well as unreleased appropriations from the 2026 GAA.
Under budget laws, if a PAP is finally discontinued or abandoned, which will make it declared as savings, it cannot be proposed again for funding for the next two fiscal years.
Unreleased appropriations are items authorized by Congress under GAA but the Department of Budget and Management has not yet released their special allotment release order or notice of cash allocation.
DAP’s shadow
Under general rules, unreleased appropriations can neither be realigned nor augmented. They could also not be pooled into savings. Meanwhile, unobligated allotments may be declared as savings only under certain rules.
The proposed legislation may be Malacañang’s move to ensure the legality of the executive’s tapping of savings, and to prevent another scenario of the savings-funded Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP), which was eventually declared by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional.
In its 2014 ruling, the Supreme Court noted that while DAP has “noble end,” it violated Section 25(5), Article VI of the Constitution prohibiting cross-border transfers of appropriations from one branch of the government to another.
