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    "id": 366171,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/366171/?format=api",
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    "content": "aimed at ensuring that there is adequate time for the legislature to undertake the necessary public participation in the budget-making process. This was also fulfilled when the Committee undertook public hearings in various parts of the country, prior to submitting their Report to the House. Hon. Members the next step was for the Budget and Appropriations Committee to lay its Report on the Estimates in the House for debate and adoption before the House can move to the Committee of Supply. The Report was laid on the Table on 6th June, 2013. However, the said Report did not contain the respective total sums to be allocated under each vote and allocations to individual programmes. Nevertheless, the Report was adopted by the House on Tuesday 11th June, 2013 and therefore, the resolution remains binding to the House unless countermanded. The question whether the Committee of Supply should then commence as provided for in Standing Order Nos.236 to 240 then follows. Hon. Members may wish to note that in the previous dispensation, Ministers who were also Members of the House would move the votes of their respective Ministries. Once the Estimates were approved, an Appropriation Bill would be introduced in the House by the Minister for Finance. That is no longer the case in the new constitutional order. Hon. Members, I have taken the liberty to explain this process of budget-making in the new dispensation in order for the House to assess whether the spirit of the provisions of Article 221 of the Constitution have been met by the resolution of the House approving the Report of the Budget and Appropriations Committee on the Estimates. This then brings us to the issue raised by hon. Mbadi, as to whether having passed the Report of the Budget and Appropriations Committee on the Estimates, the House needs to commit them to the Committee of Supply when in fact, the adoption of the Report of the Committee has already granted those votes. Hon. Members to attempt to answer this question I will be guided by Article 221(6) of the Constitution which reads as follows: “When the estimates of the national government expenditure and the estimates of expenditure for the Judiciary and Parliament have been approved by the National Assembly, they shall be included in an Appropriation Bill, which shall be introduced into the National Assembly to authorize the withdrawal from the Consolidated Fund of the money needed for the expenditure and for the appropriation of that money for the purposes mentioned in the Bill.” The Constitution, therefore, leaves the House to choose the method it deems necessary to have the estimates approved. The second question then arises: What value would the process of the Committee of Supply add to this process? For the benefit of new Members, the Committee of Supply is the stage at which the House debates the expenditure proposals, vote by vote as per the provisions of Standing Orders Nos.236 to 240. Based on the Supply resolutions, an Appropriation Bill is introduced in the House to give legal effect to those resolutions of the House. Hon. Members, to attempt to answer that second question I will be guided by Erskine May who as we all know is a leading authority in parliamentary practice and procedures. Erskine May guides that, the Supply Resolutions do not themselves constitute authority for expenditure. They serve as foundation for the legislation which"
}