THE Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP) yesterday assailed the National Capital Region (NCR) wage board for adopting a “business-as-usual” response regarding wage hike petitions.
In a statement, TUCP President Raymond Mendoza said it is unacceptable that the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board (RTWPB)-NCR is taking a tedious response to the wage petitions when Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III has ordered all wage boards to review existing minimum wage rates.
“The TUCP is enraged at this ‘business-as-usual,’ bureaucratic, time-consuming, technically tedious response of the wage board, which will further push under the workers,” said Mendoza.
“TUCP is outraged and fears that the DOLE and wage board are just ‘dribbling the ball’ to calm down the fears of workers now facing hunger as cost-of-living escalates,” he added.
The labor leader said such an approach would be impossible if the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) and the NCR wage board were really serious in providing relief to minimum wage earners.
“If it is true that DOLE Secretary Silvestre Bello III ordered all the regional wage boards to review the existing wages as they have become insufficient for the needs of workers and their families, why did the NCR wage board dismiss the original TUCP petition on a mere technicality?” asked Mendoza.
“TUCP believes that this is an attempt by the DOLE to raise false hopes and to dampen the mobilization plans of workers to protest the sub-poverty level minimum wage nationwide,” he added.
TUCP called on the NCR wage board to hasten its processes and approve the wage petitions pending before it.
“What we want is for the regional wage boards to immediately grant our wage increase petitions and to finally set a living wage that will give our workers and their families a decent life,” he said.
“Our workers need wage adjustments now, not later when they are already in the brink of starvation,” added Mendoza.
Earlier, the NCR wage board dismissed the wage petition of the TUCP citing the former’s lack of jurisdiction in petitions seeking “across-the-board” pay adjustments.
But according to NCR wage board Chair Sarah Mirasol, there are three other minimum wage petitions that have been given due course, and that they may finish the process of consultations and deliberations in early May.
In a related development, the TUCP said it will be filing a wage hike petition before the RTWPB-Region today, Monday.
TUCP said it will be asking the Soccsksargen wage board to increase the current P336 per day minimum wage rate in Region 12.
