Workers’ plight worsening

There seems to be no point in celebrating Labor Day with the contractualization of workers in the Philippines going from lingering to worsening.

This was revealed by former Labor and Employment Undersecretary Susan “Toots” Ople, who noted that the Philippine government is yet to come up with a definitive policy on contractualization, resulting in the sad truth that employers can easily make a regular employee a contractual one, or get somebody from an agency and pay him a lower salary that flouts the law.

She said that it is also difficult to identify who the actual contract workers in the country are, since they could be those who used to be employed but have been terminated or they could be those who are underemployed.

“Contractualization removes the obligation of the employers to take care of their employees. Under the existing laws, aggrieved laborers can just file a case against their employers. We all know too well that it takes years before cases of such kind are resolved,” Ople, a senatorial bet of the Nacionalista Party (NP) in the May 10 elections, told The Manila Times during a telephone interview.

She cited a brewing labor dispute at Philippine Airlines, wherein 3,000 employees who perform non-core functions (such as cargo handling and reservations) are in danger of being fired since the PAL management was looking to reduce operations cost to attract more investors.

“The tasks of these workers are intrinsic to the operations of the airline. If their termination pushes thru, they can be rehired, but they will be under contract with an agency,” Ople said.

“This is not even downgrading because when you downgrade an employee, he or she is still an employee. In this case, workers are put in another category where they cannot become regular employees anymore and as such, their employers can pay them only a minimum salary and benefits,” she pointed out.

Ople, also the president of the nongovernment organization Blas F. Ople Policy Center that assists overseas Filipino workers, urged the government to look at the planned spin-off by PAL as more than just an ordinary labor dispute considering that the affected employees have agreed to a moratorium on wage increases 10 years ago as a show of support for the company.

The differences are huge, according to the NP senatorial candidate, since a PAL employee earning P30,000 a month at present will have to accept half of that amount, without medical benefits, and lose his status as an employee of the company.

“Everything shall have changed except that he’ll still be working the same hours and providing the same service, but now under a contractual arrangement,” Ople, a daughter of former Foreign Affairs Secretary Blas Ople, explained.

PAL’s planned mass termination, she said, could set a precedent that would have dire implications on trade unionism and regular employment in the Philippines.

“If the government does not act on this, other big companies will surely find it easy to follow suit with this ‘outsourcing’ scheme, wherein you can just fire 3,000 employees at the same time,” Ople added. –LLANESCA T. PANTI Reporter, Manila Times