President Rodrigo Duterte should certify as urgent the passage of an enabling law for an international treaty on the protection of government workers’ rights to organize and negotiate the terms and conditions of their employment, according to a party-list lawmaker.
Rep. Raymond Mendoza, also the president of Trade Union Congress of the Philippines, made the call as he presented the labor sector agenda during the Task Group on Economic Recovery (TGER) and the National Employment Recovery Strategy’s (NERS) Job Summit on Saturday.
Mendoza said there must be an enabling law to be passed by Congress for the International Labor Organization (ILO) Convention 151, or the Public Service Labour Relations Convention, to ensure that the full trade union rights of public sector employees are given meaning.
The ILO 151 guarantees government employees’ rights against anti-union discriminatory acts, right to collective bargaining, and right to be heard through dispute settlement.
“[It] is only right as they are front-liners too, in the fight against Covid-19,” Mendoza said.
He also pushed for the regularization of all government workers who have provided 3 years of satisfactory service.
“Let us not make government as the number one employer of all labor-only contracting,” he said.
He called for the ratification of the ILO Convention 190, or the Violence and Harassment Convention, to finally put an end to harassment and other forms of violence inflicted on workers in the workplace; as well as ILO Convention 188, or the Work in Fishing Convention, so that the fishermen who toil and are exploited in fishing vessels are given ample protection.
Aside from solidifying international treaties, Mendoza urged the government and businesses to immediately help workers receive their vaccines against the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19).
He said the full employment for inoculated workers and their families is a “strategic way” of staving off hunger, and not just merely providing one-time assistance or dole outs.
“Mr. President, let’s give armor to our workers. Give workers the vaccine. So they can return to work, operate the factories, build the roads and infrastructures, or produce us food. And so they can receive their salaries, feed and protect their families, and no need to rely on ayuda (aid),” he said.
