Budget: is parliament relevant?

BOTH Houses of our national parliament, and the four provincial assemblies, have been holding their budget sessions. This yearly ritual reserved for the month of June will be over in the next one to two weeks. Formally, the national and provincial assemblies will be credited (or blamed) for passing the budget, but do the elected Houses have anything to do with the formulation, scrutiny or review - the essential steps prior to approval - of the budget?

Primarily, authorising the estimates of revenue and expenditure for the next year and receiving a report on the actual receipts and spending for the closing year are two of the most important responsibilities of parliament. Since the budget reflects the policies and priorities of a government and dictates policy actions for the year, it is extremely important for legislatures to have an effective role in shaping and finalising the document.

Read more: NA begins 'lacklustre' debate on federal budget

Despite two rather recent improvements in the parliamentary budget process at the national level and two at the level of some of the provincial assemblies, the role of legislatures in the budget process is rather limited and ineffective in Pakistan.

The first development at the national level, which improved the parliamentary budget process, was in the form of two amendments in the National Assembly Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business. Sub-rules 6 and 7 were added to Rule 201 in 2013 and 2016 respectively. The ministries-related standing committees were empowered through sub-rule 201(6) to be briefed by the ministries or divisions concerned on the proposals for the Public Sector Development Programme for the next budget year, with the committees sending their recommendations for inclusion in the PSDP.

Unfortunately, a budget passed by parliament can be altered without the latter being informed.

Through sub-rule 201(7), each ministry and division was required to submit a report to their respective standing committee about the status of inclusion or otherwise of their recommendations in the federal budget, and the reasons if the recommendations were not included. These two powerful amendments allow the parliamentarians to influence the development programme, provided the ministries concerned brief the committees in a timely fashion and members of the committees do their homework, send their recommendations in time and then follow up for the inclusion of these recommendations in the coming...

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