(Update) Kan Instructs Govt to Compile FY 2010 Extra Budget

Tokyo, Sept. 27 (Jiji Press)--Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan on
Monday instructed the government to compile a fiscal 2010 supplementary
budget to finance planned additional economic stimulus measures.
He issued the instructions at a meeting of senior officials of the
government and the ruling Democratic Party of Japan. The add-on budget could
be worth as much as 4.6 trillion yen, informed sources said.
The compilation of the supplementary budget would represent the
second stage of the government's three-staged economic package adopted
recently.
The government will strive to avoid relying on new debt issuance to
eke out resources for the budget, which will be submitted to the
extraordinary Diet session seen to be convened on Friday.
Instead, the government is considering using part of the surplus
carried over from fiscal 2009, the portion of fiscal 2010 tax revenue in
excess of its initial projection and the unused part of debt-servicing funds
for the current year.
Faced with a divided parliament, Kan hopes to ensure an early
enactment of the supplementary budget by reaching a consensus with the
opposition camp through dialogue.
In a related move, DPJ Policy Research Committee Chairman Koichiro
Genba has started coordinating views with other parties on the supplementary
budget. With the coordination work taken into account, the government's
submission of the budget proposal to the Diet would likely come in
mid-November or later, the sources said.
Meanwhile, a DPJ project team on economic measures held its first
meeting on Monday to work out the party's draft on the add-on budget. The
ruling party hopes to propose the draft to the government early next week
for further discussions.
The envisaged add-on budget is aimed at finance measures in such
fields as employment, human resources development, child-rearing, medical
and nursing services, infrastructure development, revitalization of regional
economies, support for small companies and regulatory reforms.
At Monday's meeting of government and DPJ executives, the prime
minister did not specify the size of government spending under the planned
budget.
DPJ policy chief Genba, who participated in the meeting, recently
said that the size of the budget would be 3.7 trillion to 3.8 trillion yen.
The figure could rise to around 4.6 trillion yen if the government
is able to enact special legislation authorizing the use of all surplus
funds carried over from the previous fiscal year.
END


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