UNFAZED by the dismissal of a P124 wage increase petition of a labor group on Wednesday, another labor group is set to file a petition for a P75 increase in the minimum wage for Cebu workers next week.
Joy Lim, spokesperson of the Associated Labor Unions-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP), said they would file their wage increase petition next week.
Lim cited ALU-TUCP’s studies that show inflation has reached 4.5 percent.
“This is a supervening event that necessitates a wage increase,” Lim said.
She also cited price increase of fuel and food as factors in filing the wage petition.
“Everything (prices) is going up but the wage remains the same,” she said.
The ALU-TUCP in the National Capital Region also filed for a P75 wage increase last March.
Lim said the ALU-TUCP in Central Visayas still filed the petition despite the bias of the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board in Central Visayas ( RTWPB- 7) to management because the wage board lacked labor group representation.
The wage board should be made up of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) 7, National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) and the Department of Trade and Industry, two representatives from the private sector and two labor sector representatives.
Lim said for the Central Visayas wage board, there is only one labor representative after the representative from ALU-TUCP resigned last year.
She said the wage board had been dismissing several wage petitions already.
She cited the latest dismissal the P124-wage increase petition of the Alliance of Progressive Labor (APL) last Wednesday, where the wage board dismissed the petition because it was filed less than one year after the last approved wage hike.
Under the Labor Code, no new wage hike can be implemented within a one-year reglementary period unless “supervening” factors justify one. Lim said that the ALU-TUCP is waiting for the wage board to appoint a representative from the labor group since last year./Reporter Candeze R. Mongaya
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