Yoon Jae-ok: "July National Assembly to Prioritize Flood Response Bills... Opposes Supplementary Budget"

Bill Proposed Last Year Pending in Legislation Committee
"Process at the July End Plenary Session Immediately" Opposition Demands
Separating Supplementary Budget... Sufficient Fiscal Capacity to Inject 2.8 Trillion Won

Yoon Jae-ok, the floor leader of the People Power Party, proposed to the opposition on the 19th to prioritize the passage of flood-related bills during the July extraordinary session of the National Assembly.

At the floor leaders' meeting held at the National Assembly that day, Yoon said, "After last year's heavy rain damage, both ruling and opposition parties introduced bills to prepare preventive measures, but neither side has been able to pass them in the National Assembly yet. Both parties should reflect on this."

He added, "Both parties must thoroughly reflect and firmly establish a parliamentary culture that prioritizes public safety and livelihood bills under any circumstances," emphasizing, "We must prioritize the flood-related bills at the plenary session at the end of July."

Yoon Jae-ok, floor leader of the People Power Party, is speaking at a press conference marking his 100th day in office held at the National Assembly on the 14th. Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

Regarding the supplementary budget (Chugyeong) proposed by the Democratic Party of Korea, he clearly drew a line.

Yoon explained, "The supplementary budget requires public consent and is expected to be controversial, so there is concern that urgent recovery support could be sidelined due to demands for the supplementary budget. We have sufficient fiscal capacity as we can execute the existing budget confirmed this year, and if insufficient, 2.8 trillion won can be allocated from the contingency fund for disaster preparedness."

He also said, "Regarding the use of the existing budget, the Democratic Party should remember that at the time of the plenary session resolution, it was decided that in case of unavoidable additional expenses such as floods, support could be provided through transfers or contingency funds for related projects such as national river maintenance," emphasizing, "If the Democratic Party also empathizes with the urgency of preparing disaster recovery and prevention measures, they should show the public a changed appearance through productive legislative activities and prompt processing of bills to respond to climate change."

Regarding the Democratic Party's criticism of President Yoon Seok-yeol's statement the previous day that "subsidies to interest cartels and corruption cartels should be completely abolished and the funds should be invested in flood recovery and damage compensation," Yoon said, "(President Yoon's remarks are) very common-sense and correct points," adding, "There is no reason or justification to oppose it."

He added, "First, we will save what can be saved from this year's budget and use it for disaster recovery and support, and when confirming the budgets for next year and the year after, we will abolish the politically wasteful subsidies that have been recklessly executed so far and use them for recovery and upgrading the disaster safety system."

Meanwhile, at the meeting that day, Yoon also considered prioritizing the passage of the River Act, Korea Water Resources Corporation Act, and other bills related to flood prevention measures. These bills have passed the Environment and Labor Committee but are currently pending in the Legislation and Judiciary Committee.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.