Senate approves bicam report on TIMTA, adjourns sessions

The Senate adjourns it sessions today, October 7, as Congress enters a month long legislative break. Plenary sessions will resume on November 3, 2015.

Before ending the session, the Senate approved the bicameral conference committee report on the proposed Tax Incentives Management and Transparency Act (TIMTA), which seeks to promote greater transparency and accountability in the grant and administration of tax incentives to business entities, individuals and corporations.

Under the bill, data and information related to the tax incentives claims of registered business entities, along with the actual amount of tax and duty incentives granted that are submitted by the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) and the Bureau of Customs (BOC) to the Department of Finance (DOF), shall be maintained by the DOF under a single database for monitoring and analysis.

Senate President Franklin M. Drilon said the Bangsamoro Basic Law and the continuing deliberations on the P 3.002 trillion national budget would be on top of the Senate's agenda when session would resume next month.

"We will resume debates on the Bangsamoro Basic Law when we come back in November and we will continue to work hard on it so hopefully, it will be passed in the Senate by December," Drilon said.

He said the Senate would start deliberating the proposed P3.002 trillion national budget for 2016. "By November, we expect that the discussions of the House of Representatives on the budget have wrapped up, and that it has been transmitted to the Senate for debates," according to Drilon.

"As we have consistently done so for the last five years, the Senate will pass the 2016 budget on schedule, for the timely delivery of government services next year," he emphasized.

He said the Senate would continue to push the passage of priority measures when session resume such as the the Customs Modernization and Tariff Act, the amendments to the Build-Operate-Transfer Law, and the Filipino Identification Act.