Opposition warms to budget plan

Opposition lawmakers yesterday showed signs of relenting after Cabinet officials said they cannot find extra money to finance the NT$50-billion public construction program but promised to distribute the supplementary budget fairly among local governments.

A day earlier, opposition lawmakers put forth a proposal that would bar the government from borrowing money to pay for the measure designed to stimulate the economy.

The opposition initiative conflicted with a cross-party agreement struck in January that stated the Cabinet may cover the spending with bonds not subject to the debt ceiling. Under the public debt codes, the Cabinet may borrow up to 15 percent of its fiscal budget. The deficit for this year stands at 14.8 percent.

"Opposition colleagues have somewhat softened after gaining more knowledge of the government's finances," TSU legislative whip Chen Cheng-lung (程振隆) said. "Chances are the debt limits will not be applied to the supplemental budget."

Economic and budget officials are expected to hold more meetings with leaders of party caucuses today in the hope the lawmaking body would speed up review of the extra spending.

To that end, they agreed to come up with a refined formula showing how the money will be allotted among the counties and cities based on their population, area and jobless rate -- at the behest of opposition lawmakers.

withholding funds

Opposition legislators have argued for such a formula, which they said would help prevent the DPP administration from withholding funds from KMT-controlled local governments.

KMT Legislator Lee Chuan-chia (李全教) said the Cabinet, when preparing the budget, purposely excluded projects considered more helpful in boosting the economy simply because they may benefit local KMT administrators.

The public construction bill, consisting of 100 small public projects, is one of the two much-touted job-creation programs the Cabinet unveiled last December to lift the economy and battle unemployment.

The other measure, designed tho provide 80,000 jobless people with one-year of work in the public sector at a cost of NT$20 billion, has cleared the legislature. Together, the measures are expected to push GDP up 0.38 percent and bring unemployment down 0.5 percent by the end of this year

Eager to implement the programs, DPP lawmakers have strongly protested what they call the opposition camp's stalling tactics.

DPP Legislator Chen Jin-chun (陳景峻) said he doubts opposition caucuses are sincere in wanting to help turn the economy around.

"By popping up new requests each day, they obviously intend to drag out review of the supplementary budget," he said. "This way they may go ahead and paint President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) as incapable of dealing with the sluggish economy."

finding money

Opposition lawmakers say that the government has not tried hard enough to find money when seeking to finance the public construction plan. They cite as an example the NT$241 billion budget earmarked for remodeling the legislative compound, as well as surplus revenues posted by the Central Bank of China and other state-run enterprises.

But budget officials said there is no way they can squeeze more money, noting that the Cabinet has conceded to sponsor the public service program with surplus revenue. Originally, the Cabinet wanted both job-creation programs to be paid for with extraordinary budgets.