What Happens Next?

I am getting tired of all this speculation about what will happen when the excise tax on cars is passed.

The real answer at the moment is “I Do Not Know!!!”

Ok, wait! Why do I say I do not know? Because there is no figure to base our computation!

I covered the Senate and Congress for quite a while and there is this thing called legislative procedure. This is the process by which bills are drafted, proposed and approved into law or sent to the trash bin.

The simple version goes like this, all bills, whether in the Senate or Congress, will go through three (3) readings, after which it will be directed to a bicameral committee which will try to marry both versions of the Senate and Congress. Once one version is agreed upon it will be sent to the President who has three options, ignore it and it lapses into law after 30-days, veto it and send it back to both houses of congress, or approve it and sign it into law.

Now some bills, like Senator JV Ejercito’s Speed Limiter Act, will have only one version because the Lower House has decided to adopt the senate’s version. This is a very quick way of turning a bill into law. There is no need for a Bicameral Committee because there is only one version. It goes straight to the President. And since then President Aquino ignored it, it lapsed into law.

At the moment, the Tax Reform Law more commonly called TRAIN, has passed the Senate. Because the TRAIN is a bill certified as urgent by the President himself and an executive department (in this case the Finance Dept.) has submitted their version of what the President wants, Congress has decided to adopt the version of the executive. Toeing party lines, Congress wants to give the President what he wants.

Both Houses of Congress now have until December 13 to complete a Bicameral Version of TRAIN.

Here is where it gets complicated. Our source in Congress tells us the Congressmen want their version approved “in toto” or “as is” because the resulting revenue is what the executive department needs for its “Build, Build, Build” program. The senate version is a very diluted form of the TRAIN that it will cause problems for the economic direction of the executive.

Marrying the two now at the Bicam level is going to be a very difficult debate.

But if, by some brilliant maneuvers of either House or Senate, before December 13, the bicam comes up with a consolidated version, there is still the President to deal with. Will he approve it or veto it. If he vetoes it, as earlier said, it goes back to both houses of congress for another round.

So what are the figures for the excise tax on cars? I don’t know!!! Why? Because both houses still has to marry the two versions.

One version says 10% under P1 million and 20% over a million pesos.

The other version has five layers that starts at 4% and goes all the way up to 60%.

Can you now see how inutile it is to be predicting full peso amounts and telling the public this is what your car will cost next year?