‘Everybody happy. Except the poor taxpayer.’
The House is convening as
a committee of the whole to look if there is a need to change the
Palace-proposed P1.4 trillion budget for 2009. The members feel the assumptions
on the peso-dollar rate and on the revenue take might no longer hold given the
US financial crisis and its likely effects on the local economy. The review
might serve as a token expression of congressional worries about the
uncertainties facing the economy, but that’s about all there is to it.
It might be prudent to scale down government spending in
anticipation of a weaker peso and lower revenues from an anemic economy. A
weaker peso means increased debt servicing, which is automatically appropriated
under the current budgeting system. Lower taxes mean a higher deficit which will
be much harder to finance given a regime of rising interest rates.
But a weaker economy is not by any means a certainty. And the
Palace, by all indications, will be sticking to its guns on this score. It will
cite the need for flexibility in addressing the very same uncertainties, and
insist on the passage of the proposed P1.4 trillion budget without any
significant changes.
We are sure we already know whose stand will prevail. Those
who are taking a seemingly independent stance now will be at the head of the
queue when Gloria Arroyo starts dispensing the largesse that comes every time
Congress is deliberating on the budget.
Nobody should be fooled. We always hear congressmen talking
about asserting the power over the purse during budget deliberation time. The
reality is the budget hearings are just an opportunity for congressmen to slip
in their pet projects. In the end, after the proper accommodations have been
extended, the budget will be passed with just cosmetic changes.
The Senate used to boast about its being the "fiscalizer."
Last year, for example, senators vowed to block the lump sum funding for
Gloria’s generic "Kalayaan" and "Kaunlaran" programs. At the end of the day, the
lump sum funding stayed. Now we have an idea why. The same transactional deals –
read "insertions" - that worked its miracles in the House proved as effective in
the Senate.
The "moro-moro" is starting. We already know the ending. The
legislators get bought. Gloria gets to spend the money as she wishes. Everybody
happy.
Except the poor taxpayer.
