Congress ratifies P6.793-trillion budget, up for Marcos approval

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December 29, 2025 | 5:15pm

MANILA, Philippines — Both the Senate and the House of Representatives have ratified the 2026 national budget, clearing the way for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to sign the P6.793-trillion spending plan into law. 

Lawmakers approved the bicameral conference committee report in separate plenary sessions at the Senate and House on Monday, December 29. 

The swift ratification comes a day after bicam delegates signed the report that reconciles the House and Senate's differences over the 2026 budget. It retains the controversial P243-billion unprogrammed appropriations and sharply reduces the allocation for the Department of Public Works and Highways.

Marcos is expected to sign the budget on January 5. If this timeline is followed, this means the Philippines will enter the new year relying on a reenacted 2025 budget for several days.

The 2026 budget marks the first time that lawmakers ratified an actual enrolled copy of the bill rather than a summary of the bicam report — a procedural change pushed by Senate leaders still smarting from last year's budget controversy over mysterious blanks that appeared in agriculture-related allocations. 

This year's budget process also broke new ground by livestreaming bicam deliberations for the first time, doing away with the typical closed-door sessions that allowed House and Senate delegates to hammer out differences in private.

Several minority lawmakers voted against the final budget due to what they see as "pork" allocations kept in the spending plan. This includes P243 billion in unprogrammed appropriations — standby funds derided as enabling discretionary spending — and increased allocations for the Assistance to Individuals in Crisis Situations program, which some say promotes patronage politics, among others.