Labor task force to meet ​on ​rest periods to mall employees

Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III (davaotoday.com)

DAVAO CITY, Philippines — Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III said the labor department is coming up with an administrative order to direct all business establishment to grant rest periods for salesgirls including male employees.

In an interview at the sidelines of the opening of the One-Stop Service Center for Overseas Filipino Workers in Gaisano Mall here Friday, Bello said the technical working group will meet on Tuesday, Aug. 15 to come up with a recommendation which will be the basis of the order.

“During their period of working they should be allowed rest time. Pumunta ka dun sa SM, walang saleslady na nakaupo, puro nakatindig yan. So hindi lang alisin yung requirement of high heels, we should also allow our salesgirls and security guards and other male workers some rest time,” Bello said.

He said in a span of an hour salesgirls or personnel who are commonly required to stand for a long period of time during their duty should be given “five to 10 minutes rest time” every hour.

“Depende kung gusto nila palabasin muna yung workers kung san sila pwede magrest ang importante allow them some period of resting (It depends on employers whether they want to allow the workers to go out to where they could rest, the important thing is they will be given some period of resting),” Bello said.

Meanwhile, the Associated Labor Unions-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP) lauded DOLE for acting swiftly on the concerns of the salesladies.

Bello on Thursday ordered the DOLE’s Occupational Safety and Health Center (OSHC), the Bureau of Working Conditions (BWC) and the Bureau of Special Working Concerns (BSWC) to come up immediately with a policy in view of an occupational safety and health hazards faced by salesladies in wearing high-heel shoes and giving rest periods to both male and female security guards and salespersons.

ALU-TUCP spokesperson Alan Tanjusay said the most of the workers were employed as short-term contractual employees.

“Most of these salesladies have been enduring the pain and the risks caused by wearing high heels shoes for the entire period of the shift for many years because they will be fired whenever they complain against it. Apart from having no security of tenure, they have no union to help them improve their plight,” Tanjusay said.

The ALU-TUCP last week urged the DOLE to draft a policy forbidding employers nationwide from requiring women employees to wear high heel shoes at work because it poses danger to their safety and health in the absence of a government regulation.

Tanjusay said the ALU-TUCP envision a policy that cover not only salesladies but promodizers in supermarkets, waitresses, hotel and restaurant receptionists, flight attendants and lady security guards. - ZEA IO MING C. CAPISTRANO (davaotoday.com)

Workers on heels

LAST week, the Associated Labor Unions-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP) did something right for long-term sufferers of pain caused by high heels. It asked the labor department to prohibit employers from requiring employees to wear heels, especially if they spend most of their hours on their feet.

According to news reports by GMA News and Philippine Daily Inquirer, ALU-TUCP was concerned that requiring workers to spend many hours standing in high-heeled shoes would cause them to suffer foot and leg pain, as well as increase the risk of workplace accidents. Now, a lot of us love our high heels. As part of the process of embracing middle age, I now spend most of my workdays in flats or other sensible shoes no more than two inches high.

But I still keep two pairs of three-inch heels for those days when pretending to be 5’8” makes an anxiety-inducing presentation go easier. Up until last year, I took 250 steps every hour, walking down stairs and office corridors, while wearing 3.5-inch wedges. (An admittedly impractical pair that I still have and love.) That continued until one day, SunStar Network Exchange Editor-in-Chief Nini Cabaero pointed out I should probably use safer footwear while chasing my daily step-count goals. (I elected not to say anything recently about her covetable boots.)

ALU-TUCP’s appeal is meant to benefit a different group of workers who, as part of their daily grind, spend long hours on their feet, like salesclerks, promo attendants, waitresses, and hotel receptionists. Apart from the absence of choice, another issue is business expense. When they require high heels as part of their workers’ uniform, how many employers have the good conscience to pay for at least part of the cost of that footwear?

Do they make sure that when employees pay for part of the cost of mandatory high heels through salary deductions, their daily pay does not dip below minimum wage? There are other good reasons to require sensible shoes. Restaurant workers, for instance, may be asked to wear slip-resistant shoes, lest they tumble and accidentally fling a cleaver at one of the chef’s vital organs. Concern for workers’ comfort is another.

A study published in March 2012 by the Journal of Applied Physiology said that long-term use of high heels “may compromise muscle efficiency in walking and is consistent with reports that high heel wearers often experience discomfort and muscle fatigue.” Before they reached that conclusion, researchers Neil Cronin, Rod Barrett and Christopher Carty observed 19 participants, of whom nine had spent at least 40 hours a week, for at least two years, shod in two-inch heels. My argument for prohibiting a high-heel requirement at work has to do with honesty.

Requiring grocery checkout clerks and sales staff to stand in heels for much of their day raises an obvious irony. It is the false elevation of a class of workers whose pay and benefits linger on the lowest rungs of the country’s corporate ladders. Now if a worker chooses to spend the day in heels, then more power to her. (Or him, for that matter.) But there’s a word for employers who require lowly-paid staff to spend their days in impractical and painful shoes: these people are the real heels. By ISOLDE D. AMANTE (On Twitter: @isoldeamante) - SunStar

Read more: http://www.sunstar.com.ph/cebu/opinion/2017/08/13/amante-heels-558140
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Union urges Duterte to set wage hike terms

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THE Associated Labor Unions-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP) is urging President Rodrigo R. Duterte to declare a nationwide across-the-board wage hike.
In a statement released on Sunday, ALU-TUCP spokesperson Alan A. Tanjusay said that the President “can text or call the wage board and tell them the amount of wage increase he desires and it will be done.”

According to Mr. Tanjusay, the President can issue “an executive order mandating a wage increase amount needed by workers and their families to cope and service with the increasing prices of goods and service.”

Sought for comment, Regional Tripartite Wage Productivity Board (RTWPB) Secretary Kim S. Lagcao said that there is no schedule for deliberations yet. He also added that he is awaiting instructions from the board.

Employers Confederation of the Philippines President (ECOP) Donald G. Dee, on the other hand, said that ECOP is still studying various options.

“We will bring forward our proposal in the meeting of the wage board,” he said in a text message.

According to TUCP vice-president and representative of the labor groups to the RTWPB deliberations, Angelita D. Señorin, the labor groups and the employers’ confederation are set to submit their position papers on Monday, Aug. 7. It is only after all the position papers are submitted will the wage board decide on the matter.

The statement released by Mr. Tanjusay noted that ALU-TUCP submitted its position paper on Friday, petitioning for an “across-the-board P184 daily wage increase... for workers in the cities and municipalities of the National Capital Region on top of the existing legislated P491 daily minimum wage.”

The RTWPB is currently deliberating on the wage increase petition of three labor groups: TUCP, ALU, and Minimum Wage Earners and Advocates, an affiliate of the Philippine Trade and General Workers Organization.

The RTWPB has conducted a series of public hearings focusing on the labor groups’ and the employers’ concerns. After submission of the position papers, the wage board has 45 days to deliberate and come up with a decision. According to Ms. Señorin, this is more likely to come in September. -- Mario M. Banzon

Hike workers’ pay, Malacañang urged

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Organized labor has reiterated its call on President Rodrigo Duterte to increase the minimum wage nationwide, citing falling purchasing power of the daily pay and rising cost of living.

The Associated Labor Unions-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP) issued the appeal even as the Regional Tripatite Wages and Productivity Board-National Capital Region (Metro Manila) deliberates this week on a final new wage increase for minimum wage workers in the region.

The ALU-TUCP earlier filed an across-the-board P184 daily wage hike for minimum wage workers in Metro Manila.

“President Duterte can text or call the wage board and prod them the amount of wage increase that he desires and it will be done. The President can also issue a presidential executive order mandating a wage increase needed by workers and their families to cope with and survive the increasing prices of goods and services. The President has a variety of options to make a significant wage hike,” ALU-TUCP spokesman Alan Tanjusay said over the weekend.

He added that the workers had been desperate for a significant across-the-board wage increase for many years but the wage board has always been granting meager wage increases despite an improving economy.

“The last time the workers experienced a significant wage hike was in 1989 or 28 years ago when then-President Corazon Aquino gave a P25 daily across-the-board wage increase nationwide. After that, the wage board has been issuing a pittance… as if the workers are beggars,” Tanjusay said.

The ALU-TUCP said workers’ minimum wage should be P675 a day, not the current P491 for workers in the NCR, adding that the real value of P491 has eroded to P375.

The wage board last year issued Wage Order (WO) NCR-20 effective June 2, 2016 granting P10 as daily COLA (cost of living allowance).

On September 6, 2013 it granted a P10 daily increase in basic wage effective October 4, 2013 and the integration of the P15 of the P30 COLA under WO NCR-17 effective January 1, 2014.

WO NCR-19 on March 16, 2015 granted a P15 daily increase in the existing basic wage effective April 4, 2015.

These increases, according to the ALU-TUCP, have been overtaken by increases in electricity and water rates, health and education costs and prices of oil including liquefied petroleum gas and basic goods and services.

Despite the gains in the economy and productivity, workers and their families have not been granted a single peso in real wage increase since 1989, it said.

According to government official figures, as of April 2017, the purchasing power of the legislated P491 daily minimum wage in NCR is only P357.09, eroded by 27.3 percent. - BY WILLIAM DEPASUPIL, TMT