Japan Ruling Camp Targets March 13 Lower House Budget Passage

Tokyo, March 3 (Jiji Press)–Japan’s House of Representatives Budget Committee on Tuesday approved a ruling bloc-backed plan aimed at securing Lower House passage of the government’s fiscal 2026 budget bill on March 13, despite opposition objections. At the day’s meeting, the committee of the lower chamber of the Diet, the country’s parliament, decided by a majority vote with support from the ruling camp to hold regional public hearings on the budget bill in Iwate and Kagoshima prefectures on Sunday and a similar hearing at the Lower House on March 10. The hearings are needed before putting the budget bill to a vote in the chamber. According to the secretariat of the Lower House, this is the first time for such a regional public hearing to be held on Sunday. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner, the Japan Innovation Party, aim to have the Diet pass the budget before fiscal 2026 starts in April. Meanwhile, Diet affairs chiefs of 14 opposition Diet groups in the Lower House and the House of Councillors, the upper chamber, agreed to urge the government to compile a stopgap budget, Kazuhiko Shigetoku of the Centrist Reform Alliance told reporters. Earlier on Tuesday, LDP Diet affairs chief Hiroshi Kajiyama and Shigetoku held talks to discuss the budget bill’s deliberation schedule. Shigetoku opposed the ruling party’s proposal for holding a question-and-answer session on March 13. But Kajiyama said, “The schedule cannot be changed.” Shigetoku also called for holding intensive sessions with the attendance of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi. Kajiyama responded only by saying he would “take it seriously.” Opposition parties in the Upper House, including the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, the Democratic Party for the People and Komeito, are also stepping up their offensive. After a meeting among Diet affairs chiefs, CDP’s Yoshitaka Saito told reporters that it would be difficult to begin deliberations in the Upper House under the current situation. At Tuesday’s Lower House Budget Committee meeting, Takaichi again sought opposition cooperation for the passage of the budget bill by the March 31 end of fiscal 2025. “Given the latest strikes against Iran, it is time to further enhance the predictability of the budget bill,” the prime minister said. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]