Proposal to track House spending, a district’s infra projects nixed

MANILA, Philippines — The House of Representatives on Wednesday rejected a budget amendment proposed by Navotas Rep. Toby Tiangco that would have mandated public disclosure of the chamber’s spending and listing all infrastructure projects allotted to each congressional district.

The proposed amendments, Tiango said, were aimed at strengthening the “credibility of the House as an institution by demonstrating that accountability applies equally to everyone.”

The first amendment would have required the House to publish quarterly breakdowns of the chamber’s spending and an annual report of each lawmaker’s expenses on its official website. The second sought to publicize “an itemized list” of all public works projects within congressional districts nationwide.

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“If we demand transparency from the executive, we must be prepared to demonstrate transparency ourselves,” Tiangco told lawmakers.

The House’s spending plan had repeatedly drawn attention this budget cycle. First, from Tiangco, who pushed the chamber’s allotment to face standard scrutiny alongside executive agencies. A budget watchdog underscored the need to examine the legislature’s budget after it cleared floor debates without questioning in September.

READ: House OKs P7.2-T spending bill on 2nd reading

The House was allotted P17.2 billion for next year. And lawmakers lodged an extra P5 billion after the Budget Amendments Review Sub-committee (BARSc) last week, which was adopted by the floor on Wednesday.

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Nueva Ecija Rep. Mikaela Suansing, who heads the House Appropriations Committee, said Tiangco’s request for quarterly publication of House spending “falls under the purview of the Commission on Audit,” leading the floor to reject his motion.

“The Commission on Audit publishes these reports directly on their official website about the report that was alluded to earlier,” she said.

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“Because these publications fall under the purview of the Commission on Audit, we are unable to preempt their decision as to whether they will publish it for the upcoming year given that it lies within the prerogative of the commission,” she added.

Tiangco said the chamber “used to do this,” as he claimed that the last time the House publicized its own spending was in 2020. “I don’t know why we stopped doing this.”

The Navotas lawmaker also sought to publicize all Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) projects within each congressional district, including the projects backed by party-list representatives lodged within a district.

The floor also rejected that request. Suansing explained that DPWH funding adheres to a standardized format, with infrastructure projects already detailed and lodged within district engineering offices responsible for site design and progress validation.

“As such, it would be difficult for the DBM (Department of Budget and Management) to reclassify the projects according to any other classification apart from that reflected in the National Expenditure Program,” she said, noting that the agency uses a specific classification format in the spending document.

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She added that public works lodged under DPWH are published too, and “projects under different district engineering offices can also be searched as per different classifications.” /cb