Transcript of Ambush Interview with Senator Franklin M. Drilon

On the sin tax bill

Are you retaining the Recto report?

We will discuss it. I will call for a meeting of the committee tomorrow. So we will decide whether we will retain it or we will recommit it to the committee. In other words, either we decide to let it stay in the plenary as is and that will be the one that will be debated upon where amendments will be introduced; or it will be recommitted to the committee and the committee will decide what to do with it. So, the initial action is: should it be recommitted to the committee, or should it just stay in plenary. If it stays in the plenary, we will proceed in the period of interpellations and the period of amendments. If it is recommitted to the committee, or the committee decides to recommit it to the committee; then, the committee will now decide whether it will adopt the same report, or file a new report.

Pero wala ng committee hearing?

Wala na. Tapos na yun. We had enough already.

Recommit means you take it out from the agenda of the plenary. How the committee will now act on the report is something that has to be decided by the committee.

The first is what to do to the report. The first decision point is 1) will it stay in the plenary? If it stays in the plenary, then it becomes the basis for the debates. If the decision is to recommit it to the committee, then the committee report is withdrawn from the plenary and it is now in the committee. The committee will now determine to re-file the report as is, or have a new report. All of those have to be decided by the committee.