P10/day wage hike for Metro Manila

MINIMUM wages in Metro Manila will be increased by P10 to a range of P429-466 per day, the Labor department announced on Friday.

The adjustment will take effect 15 days after the requisite order is published in a broadsheet. Other regions are expected to soon follow suit as the metropolis, whose increase is considered the unofficial nationwide cap, normally kicks off the annual wage adjustment round.

The Metro Manila wage board, the Labor department said, also decided to integrate P15 of the P30 cost of living allowance (COLA) ordered last year into the basic wage effective Jan. 1, 2014.

It said the increase was “unanimously” approved by the tripartite board but the Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP), which had asked for an P85-day increase and is represented in the panel, called the decision “outrageous”.

“This amount cannot even buy half kilo of rice or take a worker to work and back home,” said Alan Tanjusay, TUCP spokesperson. “Workers will strongly reject this amount,” he added.

German N. Pascua, Jr., the TUCP representative in the wage board, was not immediately available for comment. Employers Confederation of the Philippines representative Vicente R. Leogardo, Jr., for his part, insisted that the wage order was “unanimously approved”.

The P85/day wage hike petition was filed in April by a TUCP faction headed by TUCP party-list representative Raymond Democrito C. Mendoza. Another group affiliated with former senator Ernesto F. Herrera requested an P83 hike in June. Both cited rising utility costs, tuition, fares and other expenses as grounds for an adjustment.

The last increase, ordered on May 17, 2012, was for the P30 COLA and the incorporation of a previous P22 COLA into the basic wage. The increase was implemented in two tranches: P20 on June 3 and P10 on Nov. 1.

By law, minimum wages cannot be adjusted more than once in 12 months unless a “supervening condition” exists. –Businessworld