translated from Spanish: Chamber of Deputies approves project that improves regulation of use and accountability of reserved expenses

The Chamber of Deputies passed the bill regulating the information and accountability of the expenses reserved. This seeks greater transparency to this public sector budget item. To achieve this, the draft specifies that the Budgets Act will set annually the sums to which these expenditures will be raised. According to THE DC MP and member of the Finance Commission of the Chamber, José Miguel Ortíz, the probation of the project seeks to ensure “that those tax resources are used for the purposes that were actually established and not for other purposes, as has been known lately due to investigations carried out by the Public Prosecution Service.” The parliament explained that “the draft states that the reserved expenditure may only be handed over to the Presidency of the Republic, Ministry of The Interior and Public Security, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Border Directorate and Boundary Ministry of National Defense, Armed Forces, Carabineros de Chile, Police of Investigations and National Intelligence Agency”. Such entities shall be subject to internal and external control in the implementation of those resources. In addition, it is established that in crimes of embezzlement of public bodies related to the misuse of reserved expenses, the judge may increase the penalty corresponding to those convicted to a degree.

Original source in Spanish