The Senate has finished its marathon plenary deliberations on the proposed 2026 national budget in a session that lasted for 5 hours and 45 minutes, ending at around 6:30 p.m. on Friday.
On the last day of the deliberations, senators tackled the proposed funds of the Department of Health and the Department of National Defense, as well as its attached agencies.
Among the highlights of the two-week plenary deliberations are the Senate’s restoration of the Office of the Vice President’s 2026 budget to its original level of P889 million, approving it in plenary in less than 5 minutes – with no questions asked and no objections made.
Apart from this, Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian, head of the chamber’s panel on finance, said they have significantly reduced unprogrammed funds in the budget following discoveries that unprogrammed allocations from previous years turned into a magnet for corruption.
‘For 2026, the House [General Appropriations Bill] allotted 243 billion pesos. The Senate version trims this down to 174.5 billion. A reduction of more than 68.5 billion. Of the 11 line items in unprogrammed funds, the Senate version reduced them to seven, with only three cash items,’ Gatchalian said when he sponsored the budget.
The Department of Public Works and Highways’ proposed funding also suffered a significant budget cut, according to Gatchalian, noting that the agency’s funding for next year will be set at P568.56 billion.
Now that the period of interpellations for the 2026 budget has been closed, the chamber will continue tackling the budget during the period of amendments, which is set to begin on Dec. 1.
Gatchalian previously disclosed that the chamber is eyeing to pass a budget that is lower than the Palace-approved P6.793-trillion budget.