Suansing: House still backs livestream for budget bicam deliberations

The House of Representatives remains fully supportive of livestreaming the bicameral conference committee deliberations on the proposed P6.793 trillion national budget for 2026, House appropriations panel and Nueva Ecija 1st District Rep. Mikaela Suansing said on Tuesday.

Suansing reiterated the House’s position in a video message after Senator Erwin Tulfo claimed that some House members are opposed to the unprecedented livestreaming of the bicam deliberations on the 2026 national budget.

“The House has always been very firm on our commitment to opening the bicameral conference committee proceedings, more specifically livestreaming the bicam. As early as August, even before the budget deliberations, the House leadership has already made pronouncements with regard to opening and livestreaming the bicam,” Suansing said.

Members of the Senate and the House reconcile the disagreeing provisions of their versions of the proposed 2026 national budget during the bicameral conference committee deliberations.

This has always been closed to the public until some lawmakers pushed for its livestreaming earlier this year to dispel suspicions that members of Congress make illegal or ill-intentioned insertions in the government’s spending plan.

The initiative was prompted by legislative inquiries which revealed that insertions in the budget were used to fund anomalous flood control projects. 

“Senator Win Gatchalian and I are already talking about how to operationalize the livestreaming of the bicam. Simula’t sapul ay matibay na ang paninindigan ng House of Representatives patungkol sa pagla-livestream ng bicam (The House has never wavered in its position to open the bicam for live streaming),” Suansing said.

She was referring to Senate finance panel chairperson Sherwin Gatchalian, her counterpart in the upper chamber.

“The cooperation between the House and the Senate is essential as both chambers move to finalize the national budget,” Suansing added.

In a press conference on October 20, Suansing said she was happy that the President echoed the House’s position of livestreaming the bicam deliberations.

“During our very first meeting, during my first press conference as chairperson of the House committee of appropriations, I already gave the commitment of the House that the leadership is very much supportive of the thrust towards opening the bicameral conference committee deliberations. And I was happy because the President himself said that the bicam should be on livestream,” Suansing said during the press conference.

“So again, the House is very much in support [of that]. I believe Speaker Faustino ‘Bojie’ Dy III has also said the same; he came out with the statement supporting the open bicameral conference committee deliberations,” she added. — JMA, GMA Integrated News