Press Releases

The health sector should be the major recipient of rechanneled Priority Development Assistance Fund, Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto said today. Recto said PDAF should be “reinvented as a cure for the sick and a medicine for the ailing.” Specifically, Recto wants a large

The Senate is ready to roll-out a slew of improved services and privileges to members of Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) including a first ever “Members’ Rights” and reform provisions cutting down red-tape in collecting claims and having a GSIS board that is more

At least 3,732 Filipinos were languishing in jails in 53 countries at the beginning of the year, Sen. Ralph Recto said today. Of this number, 108 were in death row in six countries, with 69 in Chinese jails awaiting execution or clemency, the Senate President Pro Tempore said.

The Commission on Audit (COA) has P2.2 billion in the 2014 national budget that it can tap in hiring more auditors who can serve as “tripwires against corruption,” Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto said today. With that amount, Recto said COA can recruit 6,485 more

Pending the passage of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Bill, its features can be implanted in the national budget, beginning with the requirement to upload scanned copies of the Special Allotment Release Orders (SAROs) on the Budget department website, Senate President Pro

Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto today called for an amendment of the “anti ‘5-6’” provision in the proposed national budget by proposing that the net take-home pay of state workers, after deductions, must not be lower than P5,000 a month. Recto said the current and

As lawmakers scramble to turn pork into graft-free good projects, a Senate leader today called for a conversion of a large chunk of the Priority Development Assistance Fund into spending that will put more teachers, classrooms, science labs and even meals for malnourished

I thank the Commission on Audit for clearing my name twice. First, on the COA report itself when it categorically stated that I did not sign any documents. And second, in today’s hearing when the COA auditor-in-charge confirmed that indeed I did not sign any request, endorsement,

Scrapping the P7.5 billion Calamity Fund in the 2014 national budget, on the false suspicion that it is a presidential pork barrel, will be the real calamity, Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto warned today. “In the Richter scale of budgeting disaster, I will rank it at