diff --git a/workplans/CB-WP-0019-the-am4-family.md b/workplans/CB-WP-0019-the-am4-family.md
index a9529d7..9fac38c 100644
--- a/workplans/CB-WP-0019-the-am4-family.md
+++ b/workplans/CB-WP-0019-the-am4-family.md
@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 ---
 id: CB-WP-0019
 kind: meta
-title: "The AM-4 family's last two defects, and the self-quoting rule"
+title: "Budgets: what the meta budget is for, AM-4b's scope, and the self-quoting rule"
 status: todo
 ---
 
@@ -141,6 +141,60 @@ re-derived three times already.
 both? T03 of CB-WP-0018 used the second and it worked. Say which is load
 bearing.
 
+## Task: say what the meta budget is *for*, and set it at 80/20
+
+```task
+id: CB-WP-0019-T05
+status: todo
+priority: high
+```
+
+The maintainer, 2026-08-03:
+
+> *"we should establish a rule for what the budget is for. The main budget
+> should be spent on the task at hand while some of the budget should be
+> spent on control, review and improvement of the process we use to propell
+> us forward. We can make that 80/20 to start with and allow for increasing
+> or lowering the meta budget based on the phase or task at hand."*
+
+META-25 has a threshold and **no stated purpose** — which is why it has
+been argued about as a number three times. Write the purpose first; the
+number follows from it.
+
+### The window and the ratio have to be chosen together
+
+The budget is measured over a **trailing 3-pass window**. One meta pass
+among three, at the same cost as its neighbours, is already **33%**. So a
+20% soft line over three passes does not mean *"one pass in five is
+meta"* — it means *"one in five **and** at half the cost of a product
+pass"*, which pushes meta work toward being rushed rather than rare.
+
+| window | what a 20% line requires of a meta pass |
+|---|---|
+| trailing 3 | costs **half** a product pass |
+| **trailing 5** | costs **the same** as a product pass |
+
+**80/20 over a trailing 5-pass window is the literal reading of the
+instruction:** one pass in five, at normal cost. Adopt that, and say in the
+spec that the ratio and the window are a pair — changing one without the
+other changes what the rule means.
+
+### The phase dial, and why it must not be a dial
+
+*"increasing or lowering based on the phase or task at hand"* is right —
+stage 0 and a stabilisation phase should not carry the same ratio. But a
+threshold anyone may move is not a threshold, and this project has a
+standing rule that a limit is fixed structurally rather than raised
+(four loadability breaches, `make status`'s 40 lines).
+
+So the phase setting must be **declared, argued, and expiring**, in the
+same shape `gates.toml` already uses: a value, a reason, a `review_by`
+after which it reverts to 20 unless re-argued. Raising it silently to pass
+a breach is the failure this shape exists to prevent.
+
+**Controls:** `status.py`'s self-test must cover the new window and ratio,
+and must fail if a phase override has no reason or no expiry.
+
 ## Task: evidence
 
 ```task
@@ -160,4 +214,8 @@ priority: high
   say which, with the cost.
 - **Quote CB-WP-0018's cost by re-running the instrument.** Under the rule
   T03 writes down.
+- **The meta budget's new shape**, and what it would have said about the
+  last five passes had it been in force. If 80/20 over trailing-5 would
+  have failed passes that were plainly right to run, say so — that is the
+  ratio being wrong, not the passes.
 - **Chaos: declaration 2 of 12 in window 2, first roll at d8.**