The House of Representatives approved a modified budget bill for fiscal 2025 on Monday after the House of Councilors passed it earlier in the day.

The budget bill, which calls for general account spending of ¥115 trillion, 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 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.

Before the Lower House passed the budget bill in early March, the ruling bloc negotiated with Nippon Ishin and the DPFP to revise the bill. It struck a deal with Nippon Ishin to scrap the household income cap on eligibility for ¥118,800 aid for public and private high school students and to raise the amount of aid for private high school students to ¥457,000 from fiscal 2026.

Meanwhile, the ruling bloc and the DPFP failed to reach an agreement on the issue of raising the taxable income threshold from ¥1.03 million per year, although the ruling bloc decided to raise the threshold to ¥1.6 million for people with annual incomes of up to ¥2 million.

After the budget bill was sent to the Upper House, Ishiba decided to freeze a government plan to raise the medical expense ceiling, and the ruling coalition submitted a modified bill to reflect the decision.

It was also the first time since 1955 that an initial budget bill had been reduced in size during parliament deliberations.

The remainder of the ongoing Diet session is expected to focus on issues such as rules on political donations from companies and other organizations, fresh measures to tackle inflation, and the possible introduction of a selective dual surname system for married couples.

The ruling and opposition parties are likely to clash more severely in the run-up to this summer's elections for the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly and the House of Councilors.