On Tuesday, 22
January 2019, the Joint House Panel of the Committee on Government
Reorganization (as lead committee) and the Committee on Energy approved the amended
draft bill seeking to strengthen and streamline the operations of the Energy
Regulatory Commission (ERC). Said bill was principally authored by Energy
Chairman and Marinduque Rep. Lord Allan Velasco.
Cong. Velasco
welcomes this development and believes that the said bill, if passed into law,
would mark a milestone in electric power regulation in the country.
Among the salient features of the draft bill is the Strengthening of the
Commission itself by having more stringent qualification standards for
Commissioners; giving the ERC Limited Fiscal Autonomy so that part of its
income could be retained by the institution in order to provide competitive
salaries and benefits to its employees; and the provision of a ‘people’s
counsel’ who will serve as an advocate for consumer welfare within ERC.
“We envision that
this bill would be instrumental in addressing the ERC’s perceived inefficiency
and hundreds of backlog cases. It will
provide mechanisms to make ERC a fair, efficient, and most crucially, independent,
government regulator of the country’s ever-growing, multi-billion-peso electric
power industry”, declared Cong. Velasco.
