‘Mini-budget’ gets through in the Dewan

KUALA LUMPUR: The Consolidated Fund (Expenditure on Account) Bill involving funds of RM107.72bil to pay off urgent expenditures for 64 government entities including ministries has been passed in the Dewan Rakyat.

No MPs debated on the Bill.

Dubbed as the “mini-budget”, the Bill was tabled for the first reading on Monday. It was among the key business in the two-day special sitting of the Dewan Rakyat.

The temporary operating budget was to pay salaries of civil servants, utilities, scholarships, welfare payments as well as education services and healthcare, until the federal budget (or Budget 2023) is passed.

According to the Bill, the highest allocation of RM28.11bil was allocated for Treasury General Services.

Next in line was the Education Ministry with RM24.97bil, Health (RM17bil), Home (RM6.9bil), Higher Education (RM5.85bil) and Defence (RM5.7bil).

Besides ministries, the allocations will also go to Parliament (RM83.36mil), Keepers of Rulers’ Seal Office (RM1.8mil), the National Audit Department (RM80.41mil), Election Commission (RM32.77mil), the Attorney General’s Chambers (RM99.17mil) and the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (RM156.2mil).

The first part of the Bill tabled by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, who is also Finance Minister, was to allow the government to withdraw a sum not exceeding RM55.95bil from the Development Fund to meet the government’s urgent expenditure, pending the approval of the Development Estimates for 2023.

“Ongoing development projects have to be continued and contract payments must be serviced according to schedule,” he told the Dewan Rakyat yesterday.

Anwar said Budget 2023 would be re-tabled in February next year.

The re-tabling has to be done as the 14th Parliament was dissolved before the Budget was debated and passed by the Dewan.

There were two motions associated with yesterday’s Bill, which were tabled by Deputy Finance Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Maslan.

The first is to transfer RM35.05bil comprising the balance of the proceeds from the Malaysian Government Investment Issue or MGII (RM31.83bil) and RM3.21bil from the Malaysian Islamic Treasury Bills into the Development Fund.

The second motion was in relation to the transfer of RM16.2bil, which is the balance of the proceeds from the MGII for 2022, into the Covid-19 fund.