Metro workers get P30 daily pay hike

METRO Manila’s wage board has approved a 30-peso increase in the daily minimum pay of the workers in the metropolis, Labor Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz said Friday.

But the increase, payable in two tranches as a cost-of-living allowance, angered the left-leaning Kilusang Mayo Uno or May First Movement and disappointed an employers’ group.

“This is loose change, and it’s being given on an installment basis,” group secretary-general Roger Soluta said. He said the increase was an insult to the workers and their families.

The KMU, which supports a 125-peso legislated wage increase, said workers had no reason to be happy with the wage board’s announcement.

“It’s another reason to intensify the struggle for a legislated wage hike,”Soluta said.

The Employers Confederation of the Philippines questioned the wage increase.

“Will the wage increase create jobs? The resounding answer  is no,” said Rene Soriano, the group’s acting president. He said the increase would worsen the conditions of vulnerable workers.

“What has been happening is that the formal sector is shrinking and the informal sector is expanding,” Soriano said.

Antonio Abad Jr., an ECOP governor and legal counsel of the Philippine Association of Colleges and Universities, said it was time the government considered solutions other than a wage increase, such as widening the scope of tax credits and imposing a cap on food prices, rent and transport fares.

“Raising the minimum wage will only contribute to inflation because of its ripple effects,” Abad said.

The wage board said all workers in Metro Manila will get a 30-peso increase through a cost-of-living allowance:  P20 when the order becomes effective and P10 more by Nov. 1.

The 22-peso cost-of-living allowance granted by an earlier wage order will be incorporated into the basic pay of all minimum wage earners in the private sector, the board said.

The wage board issued its order after consultations and a public hearing on a petition filed by the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines asking for a 90-peso increase.

“The wage board has decided to provide workers with the pay increase to enable them to cope with the rising cost of living, taking into consideration, among other factors, the viability of business and industry and the average inflation rate of basic prime commodities for the period June 2011 to April 2012,” Baldoz said.

The daily minimum rate for workers in the non-agricultural sector will be P446 after the new wage order takes effect. The new rate for the agricultural sector, private hospitals with a bed capacity of 100 or less, the retail and service establishments employing 15 workers or less, and the manufacturing establishments regularly employing fewer than 10 workers, will be P409.

On Nov. 1, the second tranche of the increase will make the daily minimum rate for workers in the non-agricultural sector P456.

Agricultural workers and those employed by private hospitals with a bed capacity of 100 or less, retail and service establishments employing 15 workers or less, and manufacturing establishments regularly employing fewer than 10 workers, will be P419. –Vito Barcelo with Jonathan Fernandez, Manila Standard Today