THE Technical Education Skills and Development Authority (TESDA) said Thursday that no funds were allocated to implement the Tulong Trabaho Act, which was signed into law this year.
TESDA Director-General Isidro S. Lapeña said its proposed P19.9 billion budget for 2020 was cut by the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) to P11.85 billion.
“There are major items that are not included in TESDA [for] fiscal year 2020 NEP (National Expenditure Program). One is the Tulong Trabaho Act which was approved by the President on Feb. 22, 2019,” Mr. Lapeña said.
Under Republic Act 11230, the law aims to provide free access to technical-vocational education through a Tulong Trabaho Fund.
The measure states that funds necessary for its implementation “shall be immediately sourced from the TESDA budget in the current General Appropriations Act and hereinafter be included in the GAA of the succeeding year.”
“That is a clear violation of the law. There has to be an appropriation signed by the President. I want to put that on record that the budget for Tulong Trabaho Act must be put in TESDA so that we can implement the law that we just passed,” said Bagong Henerasyon Party-list Rep. Bernadette Herrera-Dy, who filed the bill that became the law during the 17th Congress.
TESDA’s approved budget of P11.85 billion for this year is 6% lower than the P12.55 billion it received in 2019. It remains the agency with the lowest budget allocation in the education sector, as compared to the Department of Education (P551.7 billion) and Commission on Higher Education (P40.8 billion).
“If we have more funding, we can serve more people that need assistance especially the unemployed,” Mr. Lapeña said. — Vince Angelo C. Ferreras
