Budgetary requests for fiscal 2010 from all ministries and agencies — the first such requests under the Hatoyama administration — total a record ¥95.038 trillion. Compared with the fiscal 2009 main and supplementary budgets (¥102 trillion-plus), the sum is smaller, but not against the initial fiscal 2009 budget (¥88.548 trillion).
The Democratic Party of Japan has accused the previous Aso administration of fiscal waste. If the current administration fails to tighten the budget, it will face the same criticism. The size of the budgetary requests prompted Finance Minister Hirohisa Fujii to express the hope of reducing the budget to "¥92 trillion or less." Then he mentioned "¥90 trillion or less."
It is imperative that the government retrench on wasteful projects while giving priority to such items as child rearing and education, medical and nursing care services, pensions, local autonomy and employment — as the DPJ promised during its campaign for the Aug. 30 Lower House election. At the same time, though, the government should be ready to be flexible on its election promises to meet anticipated fund shortages. It could put some election promises off to fiscal 2011.