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DP to introduce downsized budget bill, cut expenses for prosecution, audit agency, police.

Published: 01 Dec. 2024, 14:29 Updated: 01 Dec. 2024, 15:12

Park Chan-dae, floor leader of the Democratic Party, speaks at the National Assembly in Yeouido, western Seoul on Sunday. [YONHAP]

The liberal Democratic Party (DP) said Sunday that it will introduce a downsized budget bill for next year in a plenary National Assembly session this week after the party railroaded the proposal through a parliamentary committee despite the ruling party's boycott.

DP floor leader Park Chan-dae unveiled the plan two days after his party, which holds a parliamentary majority, pushed the 2025 budget bill through the parliamentary special committee on budget and accounts, defying objections from the ruling People Power Party.

The budget proposal puts next year's budget at 677.4 trillion won ($485.3 billion), down 4.1 trillion won from the initial plan proposed by the government.

"The DP has inevitably decided to introduce the reduced budget bill in a plenary meeting on Monday, the legal deadline [for the bill's passage]," Park said in a press conference.

The floor leader called the move an "extraordinary" measure to "normalize" state housekeeping, emphasizing his party's efforts to block a tax cut for the super-rich and slash the budgets for state agencies wielding power.

The budget cut affects the whole amount flagged for special activity expenses of the presidential office's secretariat and national security office, as well as those of the prosecution, the state audit agency and the police.

It also halves the government's 4.8 trillion-won reserve fund to 2.4 trillion won.

The conservative People Power Party (PPP) has denounced the move as "neutralizing the functions of the prosecution, the police and the state audit agency" by cutting such budgets, claiming such a vote is only aimed at shielding DP leader Lee Jae-myung, who faces several trials.

Park left open the possibility of a revision to the budget bill, saying, "There is sufficient room for further negotiations if the government and the ruling party show a forward-looking attitude."

The statutory deadline for approving the national budget is Dec. 2, but the National Assembly has managed to meet it only twice in the past two decades.

PPP floor leader Choo Kyung-ho immediately protested the DP's decision, demanding that the opposition party apologize for and withdraw the unilateral budget reduction.

"Such indiscriminate budget cuts constitute parliamentary violence, using the authority of budget review as a partisan tool to threaten the government and the ruling party," Choo said during a separate press conference.

He voiced concerns that these budget cuts could exacerbate economic and safety conditions for the public, urging the DP to apologize and withdraw the budget bill immediately.

"If the latest budget cuts result in any problems with people's livelihoods, public order, diplomacy or disaster response, the DP should remember that all responsibility will lie with them," he noted.

Yonhap