Government workers to get P3,000 pay hike over 3 years — Salceda

The more than one million government workers can expect to have a P3,000 pay increase over three years up to 2008, the chairman of the House appropriations committee said yesterday.

"We have granted a P1,000 adjustment this year. We will grant an additional P1,000 next year and another P1,000 in 2008," said Albay Rep. Joey Salceda.

He said the P3,000 increase that the House is planning, though spread over three years, is better than the P2,000 hike that the Senate has suggested for this year.

He added that the government cannot afford the much-higher Senate-proposed increase for 2006 because it lacks the needed funds.

Salceda also rejected the suggestion of his Senate counterpart, Sen. Manuel Villar Jr., for the use of some Senate-recommended budget cuts for the school-building program.

"Our stand on the 2006 budget remains the same: all or nothing. That is also the stand of President Arroyo," he said.

He said the House believes that the proposed P1.053-trillion budget for this year should be kept intact as it would promote economic growth.

On Tuesday, Villar said there was still hope for the approval of the 2006 outlay provided that at least P8 billion of the Senate-recommended P64-billion cuts was realigned to the classroom-construction program.

Villar said under the President’s budget proposal, the huge sum of P8 billion would be given to local government units.

Of that amount, P5 billion is to be set aside for a project labeled Kilos Asenso, and P3 billion for Kalayaan Barangay.

Responding to questions, Salceda told The STAR that the bicameral conference committee on the 2006 budget has not met since Congress went on its annual mandatory adjournment last June 9.

Bicameral conference on the outlay collapsed a week before the adjournment because the President, through her House allies, rejected the Senate-proposed cuts.

She had threatened to veto any reduction in her budget proposal.

Since January, the government had been operating on the reenacted P907-billion 2005 budget.

According to Salceda, the recycling of the much-lower 2005 outlay is not at all bad.

"It means that we will have a lower budget deficit. We can even wipe out the deficit and balance the budget (this year)," he said.

A balanced budget situation means that the government funds its needs entirely from revenue collections and does not need to borrow funds.

This year, though the administration claims that it has achieved surpluses for the past three months, it has actually borrowed more than P300 billion since the start of the year principally to pay for maturing debts.