Proposal to consider Economic Procedure and Fiscal Responsibility Bill endorsed

Kathmandu: A meeting of the House of Representatives (HoR) today endorsed a proposal to consider the Economic Procedure and Fiscal Responsibility (first amendment) Bill, 2081 BS.

The document proposed by Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Bishnu Prasad Paudel was endorsed by a majority of votes. In his response to queries of lawmakers during the theoretical discussions on the Bill, Minister Paudel said the Bill aimed to mainly strengthen the budget implementation system, making this system more effective and disciplined.

The discipline during budget drafting has been highly realised and it has been too late to work towards that end. He apprised that it has been challenging to bear the general expenditures in the current fiscal year while the budget is based on the 31 percent revenue target.

Around 1800 projects were selected for the current fiscal year and the guarantee of their implementation has been highly challenging, he said. The government is aware of the role of development partners and the needs and priorities of Nepal while formulating the budget. ‘Projects capable of yielding high results have been focused.’

Echoing the need of amending some of the provisions of the Public Procurement Act, he said the government is working towards that end. Before this, lawmakers expressed their concerns over increased revenue leakage, the shrinking of foreign aid, liquidity in the banking sector, lack of systematisation of the economic system and the growing size of public debt ( above 2600 billion).

They also raised the voices over the lack of capital expenditures by the local and provincial governments, the need of giving priority to projects capable of promoting the nation’s economy and the promotion of fiscal discipline.

Dr Amersh Kumar Singh, Devendra Paudel, Rajendra Kumar KC, Abdul Khan, Janardan Sharma, Hitaraj Pandey, Bimala Subedi, Juli Kumari Mahato, Madhav Sapkota, Shakti Bahadur Basnet, Guyanu Basnet Subedi, Prem Suwal, Saraj Ahmad Faruki and Narayan Sharma took part in the discussions.

RSS