Three regional wage boards, including the one for Metro Manila, issued orders raising the minimum daily wage by P10 to P25, but labor groups warned of mounting industrial unrest over what they saw as an inadequate adjustment in the face of rising inflation.
In a press briefing, Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III said minimum wage earners in Metro Manila will receive an additional P25, raising the minimum wage from P512 to P537 for non-agricultural workers.
The salary adjustment also covers retail and service establishments employing 15 workers or less and manufacturing establishments regularly employing fewer than 10 workers, raising the minimum wage in this sector from P475 a day to P500 a day.
Regional wage boards in Cagayan Valley (Region 2) and Mimaropa (Region 4-B) also issued orders raising the daily minimum wage from P10 to P20.
In Region 2, the board approved a P10 increase and a P10 cost-of-living allowance. New minimum wage rates will range from P320 to P360, across different sectors.
In Region 4-B, increases ranged from P12 to P20 a day, bringing the daily minimum wage to P283 to PHP320 across different sectors.
The Labor Department said as of end of October, 16 of the 17 regional boards have issued new wage orders, granting increases in the current minimum wage rates ranging from P9 to P56.
Only the Regional Board of Caraga (Region 13) has yet to issue a wage order.
Various labor groups warned of industrial discord following the official announcement of the daily wage hikes.
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The Association of Labor Unions-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines and Partido Manggagawa said the measly increase would only lead to more to pickets and lockouts and other forms of expression of protest and deep dissatisfaction, ultimately breaking the industrial peace conducive for sustaining the country’s economic growth.
Bello said the P25 increase was decided based on the capacity of enterprises to pay the additional labor costs without impairing business, especially its capacity to continuously generate jobs.
But ALU-TUCP vice president Louie Corral said that hunger and poverty will only escalate and this will cause more instability on the labor front.
The ALU-TUCP earlier petitioned the board to grant a P334 daily wage hike on top of the existing amount to enable Metro Manila workers to cope with rising cost of living following an erosion their purchasing power as a result on new taxes imposed by the government and the rising cost of food and other commodities.
“Twenty-five pesos is short by 30 percent to make up for the P35.84 erosion in wages due to the 7 percent inflation in the NCR recorded in August this year. Partido Manggagawa’s own cost of living estimate for a family of five in Metro Manila is around P1,300 a day, more than double the new minimum wage of P537,” the chairman of PM, Rene Magtubo, said in a statement.
“The whole controversy about the NCR wage hike just proves that no matter how hard workers make a devotion to Santo Rodrigo, they will not be blessed with a sufficient wage order. The problem lies in the system of wage regionalization in which wage boards base their wage hikes on the capacity to pay of employers and not on the cost of living of workers,” he added.
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Senator Joel Villanueva agreed that the P25 increase in Metro Manila was inadequate.
“Even if we suspend the tax on fuel this January, prices will continue to increase because of other factors contributing to inflation,” Villanueva said.
He said the more sensible solution was to lower the value-added tax rate from 12 percent to 10 percent.
Senator Paolo Benigno Aquino IV said a wage hike must be coupled with efforts to lower the price of goods, including a suspension of the excise tax on fuel under the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion law.
In the House, two leftist lawmakers assailed what they described as a measly wage hike granted by the Metro Manila wage board.
At the same time, party-list Representatives Antonio Tinio and France Castro of ACT Teachers reiterated the call of workers nationwide for national minimum wage and the repeal of the regressive provisions of the TRAIN Law.
“The P25 measly wage hike for one region will not be enough to compensate price hikes from TRAIN as workers all over the nation endure the price hikes of basic goods due to TRAIN 1. They are demanding for a P750 national minimum wage not loose change of P25,” Tinio said.
Tinio said the P512 minimum wage in the National Capital Region can barely cope with the increasing prices of basic goods.
“We can only imagine how workers from the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao fit their daily wages receiving only P262 with the nationwide effect of TRAIN 1 making the call for a national minimum wage just and timely,” he said.
Castro pushed for the passage of House Bill 7877, which establishes a national minimum wage and imposing stiffer penalties for violations. With PNA
READ: Workers insist on P334 wage increase