DEC
02
2016

Problem hiring? Tap millennials to fill 6,000 COA vacancies—Recto

The Commission on Audit (COA), the taxpayer’s whistleblower, should be promoted as a “premier destination” for “talented and idealistic millennials” who would like “to do good by going into government service.“ Senate Minority Leader Ralph Recto suggested this “recruitment tack”
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DEC
01
2016

Free tuition looms for 1 M state college students; Recto amendment gives P5.7 B to SUCs for new bldgs

Close to a million students of state colleges and universities (SUCs) will not pay tuition next year if Minority Leader Ralph Recto’s amendment to the 2017 national budget to exempt them from basic matriculation will be carried in the final version of the P3.35 trillion spending
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DEC
01
2016

Senate hikes DOLE’s OFW repatriation fund to P100 M, but Recto wants P1.5 B to help distressed Pinoys abroad

The Senate has adopted Minority Leader Ralph Recto’s proposal for the creation of a P100-million “emergency repatriation fund” in the national budget to be used by the Labor secretary to bring home distressed OFWs next year. Recto, however, challenged administration lawmakers to
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NOV
27
2016

‘Agencies must spend the buck and not pass the buck’

There is an emerging bad habit among agencies to transfer their allocations to other agencies and then report such transactions as fund utilization. In the case of the Department of Transportation, this is the scheme resorted to in its unused budget for airport improvement
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NOV
26
2016

Recto optimistic on hiked funding to combat malnutrition

Senators spearheading the bicameral push to increase the per meal budget of free school lunches are optimistic that the Senate version of the 2017 national budget would carry their proposal. Senate Minority Leader Ralph Recto based his optimism on the admission by heads of the
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NOV
25
2016

Duterte administration could spend up to P26.7 trillion in 6 years

The Duterte administration is forecast to spend P26.7 trillion in six years in power, and Senate Minority Leader Ralph Recto wants government to link the rise in expenditures with the decrease in the number of the poor, the hungry and the unemployed. Recto described next year’s
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NOV
24
2016

Minority seeks cuts in budget for travel, utilities, representation, non-essential overhead 

Senate Minority Leader Ralph Recto is pushing for a minimum 10 percent cut in the bureaucracy’s cellphone, electricity, travel, gasoline, advertising, and other non-essential expenses, which he said would free billions for health and other social services. Recto manifested this
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NOV
22
2016

Use OP intel fund in finding Abu Sayyaf, killers of top revenue officials

If they were killed by scalawags out to sabotage your anti-corruption program, then please use the presidential intelligence fund in finding their killers. In making this unsolicited advice to President Duterte, Senate Minority Leader stressed that the recent brazen killing of
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NOV
22
2016

No more en-DOH for thousands of nurses after minority cites funding sources

The Department of Health will no longer hand out pink slips to thousands of nurses and other field personnel next year after its officials assured senators that it will observe the status quo in its Rural Health Practice Program (RHPP), which was originally programmed to shed
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