Extraordinary Weekend Session of the Diet

The House of Representatives passed the FY 2024 budget bill and sent it to the House of Councillors on Saturday February 2nd, with highly unusual weekend session. Although the opposition parties argued the discussion over the budget bill was not enough, the leading parties unilaterally decided to end the discussion and take votes in the committee and Plenary Session. The passage of the bill guaranteed the budget to be enacted on April 1st, the beginning of FY 2024. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida insisted on securing the budget to ensure his administration was viable for promoting policies.

Kishida planned to set the Political Ethics Committee on February 28th and 29th and pass 2024 budget bill on March 1st in the House of Representatives. However, some of the leaders of Abe faction refused to attend the committee to take questions, if the committee would be open to the public, and the committee session on February 28th was cancelled. That was why Kishida decided to attend the committee to move the procedure forward.

 

The decision of Kishida worked for achieving his goal. Not only the leaders of Abe faction agreed on attending open committee following Kishida, but the negotiation between parties over the Diet procedure was accelerated. The chairman of each committee has power to set a session when the committee members cannot reach a conclusion. The chairman of Committee on Budget, Itsunori Onodera, set a session on March 1st with his authority.

 

The opposition parties protested it by submitting a move for dismissal of Onodera. The move was voted down in the Plenary Session on March 1st. Following tradition that all the sessions are halted when a move for non-confidential or dismissal was submitted, the session of Committee on Budget set by Onodera’s authority on March 1st was cancelled, but postponed to next day. The opposition parties no longer refused the session on Saturday, partly because the budget included some spendings for assistance to Noto Peninsula, which was suffering from a major earthquake in January.

 

On March 2nd, Committee on Budget in House of Representatives made the last discussion for about six hours and approved the budget bill with majority of votes. The bill, then, was immediately discussed in Plenary Session and approved with support of Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito. It was sent to House of Councillors. Article 60 of Constitution of Japan determines that the decision on budget by House of Representatives will be the decision of the Diet, if House of Councillors fails in taking final action within 30 days after receipt of the budget. The budget will be activated on April 1st at the latest.

 

The parties agreed on establishing a special committee for discussing slush fund scandal in the House of Representatives. In the Political Ethics Committee on Friday, the recognition of the leaders of Abe faction on when the faction decided to resume the kickback system in 2022 was contradicted each other. Investigation on the scandal in the Diet will not be finished soon.

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