February 2, 2004

WASHINGTON – Following the release of the President’s budget proposal today, Wisconsin’s First District Congressman Paul Ryan commented on the need for spending discipline and called on Congress to reform the process it relies on every year to spend tax dollars.  Ryan said:

“The President’s budget takes some good steps toward reforming the broken budget process and restraining spending, but it doesn’t nearly go far enough.”

“We’re at the start of a new budget season, and there’s no better time to look at how the government goes about spending taxpayers’ money.  Businesses must be accountable for their finances, and so should the federal government.  By improving Washington’s accounting practices, we can get a more accurate and honest picture of how the government spends our tax dollars and how much is in the Treasury.  And we need a complete overhaul of our budget process to make it easier to rein in excess spending.”

Rep. Ryan has been a principle author of budget process reform legislation in the House of Representatives. Later this week, Ryan, along with Reps. Hensarling of Texas, Cox of California, and Chocola of Indiana will introduce new consensus legislation to fix the broken budget process.

“Even when the President and Congress agree overall on the need to keep spending in check, the current budget process doesn’t encourage thrift.  It practically invites the government to spend beyond its means,” Ryan said. 

"For the past two years, I have proposed legislation to reform the federal government’s budgeting and accounting procedures.  And I’m currently working with like-minded colleagues to make sure Congress acts on a budget reform plan so we can better control runaway spending.”