Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is defending his party’s push to bring legal casino gambling to the land of the rising sun.

After three years of stasis, Japanese lawmakers pushed their Integrated Resorts Promotion (IR) bill through the Diet’s lower house on Tuesday. The bill has now been sent to the upper house for committee debate ahead of a possible vote as early as Friday.

Pro-casino legislators are trying to push the bill over the top before the Diet’s current session concludes on December 14. But the speed with which the IR bill is progressing has left many legislators, including some in Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), complaining that insufficient debate is being held on such a weighty subject.

On Wednesday, Abe (pictured) was in the Diet, where he responded to pointed criticism from Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) chief Renho Murata, who said Abe’s claims that he hadn’t “steamrolled” the IR bill meant “you lie just [as easily] as you breathe.”