Bukit Mertajam lawmaker Steven Sim said Article 101 of the constitution required a Supplementary Supply Bill be tabled in the case of excess in government spending.

“However with hidden, unseen and invisible expenditures, there is no way to know if the government has spent beyond its limits.

“This means that the government can actually circumvent the constitution by avoiding to table the supplementary budget,” he told reporters in a press conference at the Parliament lobby here.

Sim also claimed that “invisible expenditures” were 1.5 times higher than visible ones, a suspicion that led him to file a motion to have Najib referred to the Parliamentary Rights and Privileges Committee.

To prove his point, Sim cited as an example, the development expenditure Budget for Communications and Multimedia, that was estimated in the region of RM495 million.

This however excluded the RM1 billion allocated for broadband infrastructure upgrades, and the RM340 million required to equip 430,000 teachers with tablets.

“If they are included, the whole development expenditure will balloon to RM1.8 billion, an increase of 260 per cent,” said Sim.

Claiming that it would be impossible for lawmakers to vote for the recently tabled Budget 2017 when they were not even able to properly scrutinise its details, Sim urged Speaker Pandikar Amin Mulia to give his motion a serious consideration.

“If an item was announced in the Budget speech but is missing from the document, how will MPs and others be able to scrutinise and analyse the Budget effectively?”

Sim filed the motion against Najib last week.

Earlier today however, Pandikar told Sim that the Finance Ministry would address the concerns he raised.