(Update) Japan FY 2025 Budget Enacted Just in Time

   Tokyo, March 31 (Jiji Press)--Japan's House of Representatives, the lower chamber of the Diet, approved a modified budget bill for fiscal 2025 on Monday, after the House of Councillors, the upper chamber, passed it earlier in the day.
   The budget bill, which calls for general-account spending of 115,197.8 billion yen, was thus enacted in time for the start of the next fiscal year on Tuesday.
   It was the first time under the country's current Constitution that a government budget was enacted after being modified in the Upper House.
   Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, who leads a minority government, secured the support of Nippon Ishin no Kai (Japan Innovation Party) for the budget bill by revising it in both the lower and upper chambers, on the issues of tuition-free education, the taxable income threshold and the ceiling on out-of-pocket personal medical expenses.
   On Monday, the bill was approved at a plenary meeting of the Upper House by a majority vote mainly from the Liberal Democratic Party-Komeito ruling coalition and Nippon Ishin, while the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan, the Democratic Party for the People, the Japanese Communist Party and Reiwa Shinsengumi voted against it. It was then sent back to the Lower House.

(2025/03/31-18:58)