House committee slashes 2020 budget by B16.2bn

The House committee vetting the fiscal year 2020 budget bill has slashed 16.2 billion baht from the requested amount of 3.2 trillion baht, according to Ruangkrai Leekitwattana, a committee member.

The committee has now finished deliberating the bill with the measure awaiting its second and third readings set for Jan 8 and 9, he said.

While the approved budget is less than that sought, the committee members from the Pheu Thai Party stood by their proposal to cut the budgets requested by each ministry by between 10% and 15%, he said.

This means this proposal will be discussed again during the bill’s second and third readings, he said, adding the proposed cut won’t apply to sections of the bill dealing with the monarchy.

Mr Ruangkrai himself reserved the right to have his proposed cut to the contingency budget debated in the bill’s second and third readings as well, he said.

The contingency budget was initially set at 96 billion baht, but he proposed to slash it by 40 billion baht.

Since there would be only about seven months of the fiscal year left by the time the budget bill was passed into law, the full amount in the requested budget would not actually be needed, he said.

The three ministries facing the biggest cuts are the Defence, Public Health and the Higher Education Science Research and Innovation ministries whose budgets were cut by 1.5 billion baht, 1.3 billion baht and 1.1 billion baht respectively, according to a source.

Meanwhile, chief opposition whip Sutin Klungsang, from the Pheu Thai Party, said opposition whips should finalise plans to file a censure motion by Jan 20, with the debate taking place in parliament some time between late January and early February.

The five cabinet ministers already included on a tentative list to face grillings in the no-confidence debate are Prime Minister and Defence Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha, Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak, Deputy Prime Minister Wissanu Krea-ngam, Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai and Interior Minister Anupong Paojinda, said Mr Sutin.

Deputy Prime Minister Gen Prawit Wongsuwon will possibly be added to the list of those to face a grilling later, said Mr Sutin.