Domestic workers or “kasambahay” in Metro Manila may see their monthly pay rate go up from P3,500 to P5,000.
This is after the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board for the National Capital Region on Friday approved a P1,500 increase in their monthly minimum wage.
Domestic workers had their last wage increase in December 2017, as the National Wages and Productivity Commission raised their monthly pay to ₱3,500 from ₱2,500.
The NWPC will still have to approve the order of the Metro Manila wage board.
Meanwhile, activist teachers staged a rally at the gate of Malacañang to hold President Rodrigo Duterte accountable for the “paltry pay hike” in the offing and “inequitable” grant of bonuses in government.
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The Alliance of Concerned Teachers Philippines unfurled an image of a black “parol” or Christmas lantern bearing their sentiments of “#BigongPangako” and “P1,500 ‘di sapat, P30k dapat!” (Broken promises, bigger raise needed).
ACT raised its disappointment over recent news that the Office of the President is granting P60,000 in Christmas bonuses to its employees and the House of Representatives is giving P150,000 of the same to its staff.
This while the Department of Education announced that teachers will not yet get the whole of the P10,000 Service Recognition Incentive recently ordered by the President, as the agency has yet to determine if it has enough funds to shoulder its 30-percent counterpart to pay the benefit, the group noted.
In an order, the NCR wage board said the suggested minimum wage scheme only applies to persons who do domestic work, such as cooks, gardeners, and laundrymen or women, and not to family drivers or “any other person who performs work occasionally.”
Under the new wage order, an employer who withholds the salary of their domestic employees may be ordered to pay a fine of P10,000 to P40,000.
The employer is also required to provide household workers with at least three adequate meals a day, humane sleeping arrangements, and medical assistance if needed.
Violators may also be held civilly and criminally liable under Republic Act 10361, the act instituting policies for the protection and welfare of domestic workers.
“The paltry pay hike is the President’s primary responsibility as he is the one who failed his promise,” ACT said in a statement.
While the Congress-approved Salary Standardization Law is yet to be signed by President Rodrigo Duterte, the economic managers themselves said “the amounts are approved by the President and he himself certified the bills as urgent,” said Joselyn Martinez, ACT Philippines chairperson.
With President Duterte’s certification of SSL V as urgent, identical versions of pay hike bills were passed in the Lower House and Senate before the sessions closed this week.
The legislations bore a monthly pay hike of a little over P1,500 for teachers every year until 2023.
The amounts are a far cry from the President’s campaign promise of doubling teachers’ salaries or ACT’s call to hike the entry-level salaries of teachers from P20,754 to P30,000 monthly, the group noted.
“We challenge the President to veto the SSL V bills and immediately issue an executive order that would fulfill his promise, it is the only way that he can make amends with teachers whom he had made to wait for more than three years, only to be granted an insulting pay hike of P52 per day,” Martinez said.
The OP issued Administrative Order 19 for the grant of P10,00 Service Recognition Incentive to all government workers last Dec. 2, to be released not earlier than Dec. 20.
Per the order, 70-percent of the funding for the benefit shall come from the DBM while 30-percent shall be shouldered by the personnel services funds of the respective agencies.
“The discrimination against teachers in terms of salaries and benefits is already too much, that it is causing disillusionment among our ranks. Our nurses, police officers, and soldiers are sure to get P30,000 monthly salaries next year while we will be forced to scrimp on P22,316. While some employees will be spending lavish holidays with hefty bonuses, P10,000 at the least, we will only be getting P7,000. Where’s the justice here?” Martinez lamented.
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