The bicameral conference committee on the proposed 2026 national budget decided on Tuesday night to temporarily skip discussions on the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) as the Senate team continues to recompute project figures.
Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian, who heads the Senate panel, said the move followed a letter from Public Works Secretary Vince Dizon apologizing for the “insufficient and limited data and information” earlier submitted on the lower Construction Materials Price Data.
Gatchalian said the Senate received the revised adjustment factors at around 10 a.m. and immediately began recalculating the budget cuts affecting some 10,000 DPWH projects for 2026.
“We just received this letter […] and the revised adjustment factor at around 10 a.m.,” Gatchalian said, noting that applying the previous adjustment factors to the same number of projects had taken three weeks.
“And we were, this is a very daunting task given that we have a timetable that we have to achieve because of this bicameral conference committee,” he added.
Gatchalian said the Senate team was unable to finish the recomputation in time for the bicam meeting, which started at 8:02 p.m.
“So the team assured me that hindi ho sila matutulog tonight, hindi ho sila uuwi, and they assured me that all of these things will be ready by tomorrow,” he said.
He then asked the House panel to proceed first with discussions on other agencies while DPWH computations were being finalized.
Nueva Ecija Rep. Mikaela Suansing, who heads the House contingent, agreed and said she understood the extent of work involved in adjusting the figures.
“So with that, the House contingent looks forward to seeing the output of this new exercise done by the DPWH,” Suansing said.
The bicam discussions have been delayed by disputes over Senate budget cuts to DPWH projects, which Dizon earlier said were based on the wrong application of adjustment factors.