Repercussions of suspending TRAIN on free education feared

The Commission on Higher Education (CHED) has warned of serious repercussions of suspending the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion Law (TRAIN Law) – particularly on the implementation of the free higher education.

Congress has allocated 140

billion in the 2018 General Appropriations Act for this law to provide free higher education (tuition, miscellaneous, and other fees) in State Universities and Colleges (SUCs) and Local Universities and Colleges (LUCs), Tertiary Education Subsidy (TES), free Technical-Vocational Education and Training (TVET) for those enrolled in state-run Technical Vocational Institutions, Tertiary Education Subsidy, and a Student Loan Program. The budget is anchored on revenues generated under the TRAIN Law, CHED Officer-in-Charge Prospero De Vera said.

He added that the billion is supposed to cover SY 2017-2018 and 2018-2019. “Our proposal for next year is to increase the budget for RA 10931 for another because we will admit new batch of students and we want to increase the 300,000 slots for TES, we want to increase the number and increase it to 400,000 so we can help more,” he explained.

“So we cannot expand access to education, we cannot increase the budget if TRAIN is suspended, it’s as simple as that,” he explained. “Our revenues will be less if there is less money to allocate [thus] we will have to cut back on the expectations for RA 10931 if the TRAIN is suspended,” he said.

De Vera said that once the TRAIN Law is suspended, the implementation of the Republic Act 10931 or the Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act (UAQTEA) signed into law by President Duterte in August, 2017 will be greatly affected.

De Vera explained that “allocation of the program cannot continue at the same level if we don’t have the revenues.” He also noted what will happen to the next batch of K to 12 graduates who are looking forward to enter universities in 2019 on the premise of free higher education. “There will be less money to allocate for reimbursing the universities which will give free tuitions,” he said. “At best, we have to retain existing levels if there is no revenue… at worst, we need to have cutbacks,” he stressed.

Around 1.3 million students are expected to benefit from free tuition and miscellaneous fees until next year. “We need money to subsidize their education,” De Vera said. If the TRAIN Law is suspended, CHED is not sure what happens to the implementation of the RA 10931. “We’re not sure of that because the computation of the billion is anchored on the TRAIN revenues and on the existing number of students, so there will be students who will have no funding,” he added.