Executives of the three ruling parties agreed Tuesday to try to push the fiscal 2002 supplementary budget, the fiscal 2003 budget and tax-related bills through the Diet by the end of March, party officials said.
The secretaries general of the Liberal Democratic Party, New Komeito and the New Conservative Party also agreed to pursue the passage of two controversial packages of bills by the end of the next Diet session. One package relates to contingency legislation and the other to the protection of information and individual privacy.
The bills aimed at protecting privacy were scrapped in the previous Diet session amid concern that the legislation would seriously constrain the activities of the press, particularly investigations of political scandals.
The ruling camp now plans to convene the next ordinary Diet session on Jan. 20. Barring an extension, the session will run through June.