October 9 Legislative Report: Rebuilding Korea Party Stacks Budget Committee with Education Committee Double Roles

Kim Ji-hong, a member of the Special Committee on Budget and Accounts, has begun full-scale deliberations on the 2025 budget bill.

What Dual Roles on the Education and Budget Committees Signal

According to publicly available National Assembly records, Rep. Kim Ji-hong of the Rebuilding Korea Party has been assigned to both the Special Committee on Budget and Accounts and the Education Committee in the 22nd National Assembly. The Budget Committee is where the government's budget bill is reviewed line by line, with decisions made on cuts and increases. The fact that Kim also serves on the Education Committee means his influence is likely to be concentrated in discussions over the allocation of next year's education budget.

Fellow party members Reps. Kang Su-yeon, Park Min-won, Choi Hae-bum, Jung Tae-hoon, Lee Sang-jo, Roh Gun-ho, and Kim Woo-sun, as well as Rep. Yu Heung-sik, have also been confirmed to serve on both the Budget Committee and the Education Committee. This has led to interpretations that the Rebuilding Korea Party has deliberately concentrated its personnel along the education budget review line. When a party's standing and special committee assignments are skewed toward a particular area relative to its negotiating bloc size, it gains greater bargaining power in budget negotiations for that area.

The National Assembly's Home Stretch on Budget Review

The timing is also noteworthy. The National Assembly has entered the latter half of the regular session, with a string of votes on bills in education, welfare, and agriculture. The revised Rural Development Special Account Act passed at a plenary session in early October revealed signs of defection within the Democratic Party alone, with 16 votes against. Reps. Jung Chung-rae and Eoh Ki-goo, among others, joined the opposition. Budget review is highly likely to proceed along the same lines of internal party disagreements.

The Superintendents' Association's recent visit to the National Assembly, where it asked Finance and Economy Committee Chair Cho Seung-rae and others to explicitly earmark primary and secondary education funds in the Future Response Fund, is another pressing issue that hangs directly on Budget Committee deliberations. The move seeks to secure funding separate from the local education finance subsidy, and the coordinating role of Budget Committee members is expected to come into focus.

Education and Healthcare Issues Drive Budget Negotiations

Political pressure in education is also considerable. Some 20,000 teachers from the Korean Federation of Teachers' Associations, the Korean Teachers and Education Workers' Union, and the Teachers' Union gathered in front of the National Assembly in Yeouido, Seoul, to push for revisions to the Child Abuse Prevention Act protecting teachers from malicious child abuse reports. Legislation and Judiciary Committee Chair Seo Young-kyo has also expressed her commitment to revising the relevant law. Demands on Education Committee members, combined with budget review, could lead to discussions on reflecting school safety and teacher protection measures in the budget.

Meanwhile, 10 People Power Party lawmakers, including Reps. Park Jeong-ha and Kim Tae-kyu, voted against the revision of the Emergency Medical Services Act, exposing internal party rifts over healthcare policy. Given that Rep. Yu Heung-sik, a former medical professional, sits on the Budget Committee, such conflicts could resurface during the process of adjusting the health and medical budget.

Looking Ahead: Education Budget Allocation and Bargaining Power

Rep. Kim Ji-hong's participation in budget review will likely extend beyond individual activity to influence the shape of budget negotiations between negotiating blocs. Even a minor party can play kingmaker in a specific area if its committee assignments are concentrated there. In particular, if negotiating blocs' interests diverge over the size of the Education Special Account or whether to increase primary and secondary education spending, the votes of the Rebuilding Korea Party's Budget Committee bloc could emerge as a key variable.

Given the constitutional deadline of passing the budget bill within the regular session, line-by-line and item-by-item adjustments at the Budget Committee are expected to intensify in the coming weeks. With attention focused on the two contentious areas of education and healthcare, the deliberations of Kim Ji-hong and other lawmakers holding dual roles on the Budget and Education Committees will be a point to watch as they shape the final form of the budget bill.