Protect app-based bike and motorcycle riders — ALU

The labor federation Associated Labor Unions-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP) on Thursday urged the government to provide protection to the growing two-wheel and four-wheel app-based riders who are playing a vital role in keeping the economy alive during this pandemic crisis.

Gerard Seno, National Executive Vice President of ALU, said motorcycle riders are emerging as one of the most vulnerable workers since the online selling apps came to thrive.

“We all saw and felt how these riders provided us convenience in our day to day lives, they are keeping the economy moving particularly during COVID19 quarantine lockdown yet they have no fixed wages and social protection benefits standards, and devoid of work safety and health standards for their well-being,” he said in a statement.

The group said motorcycle riders provide mobility service to app-based and online businesses and employers in transporting passengers, food and non-food deliveries amid constant exposure to air pollution, rain and extreme heat. 

This is aside from the lack of safety protection against the risk of coronavirus exposure in their daily work operation.

ALU TUCP said although it provided jobs to thousands of workers in the formal and informal economy who were displaced by the pandemic shutdown, the emerging gig workers are only regarded by mobile and online apps owners and operators as mere “business partners”, “freelancers” and/or “independent contractors” to evade labor responsibilities and obligation that an employer-employee relationship requires. 

“App-owners and operators, who should be the principal employers, also ignore the most important standard wages and social protection benefits and payment due these type of gig economy workers despite of a clear working existence of an employer-employee relationship between them,” said the group.

Seno said it is unfortunate that there is no law or policy that directly caters to welfare and interests of the growing motorcycle and four-wheel gig industry workers.

On Wednesday, some riders from FoodPanda Riders Association staged a motorcade rally in front of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) in Intramuros,Manila to ask the department to conduct an inspection on the disadvantagious enterprise’  new grading work payment scheme enforced recently by the company. - by Leslie Ann Aquino

TUCP Leaders Update November 17, 2020

Labor groups back probe into foreign workers, stress protection of their rights

The Trade Union Congress of the Philippines, the country's biggest labor group, is raising the alarm on an alleged influx of more Chinese workers into the country's critical infrastructure and across several industries, saying this "[brings] more serious implications to local employment and to national security."

This, while labor groups welcome a possible Senate probe into the growing number of undocumented foreign workers in construction and in Philippine Overseas Gaming Operators as well as in other industries.

Although Senate leaders have indicated support for a potential probe, no resolution — which would direct Senate committees to schedule hearings — have been filed yet.

"The Chinese workers are present or are coming in to the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines," TUCP spokesperson Alan Tanjusay said. He added that Chinese workers will be coming in through "tied-aid" projects like the Kaliwa Dam and railways projects.

"The Chinese are in strategic sectors — power, water, communications, transport, and construction where they not only take away jobs from Filipinos, but also embed themselves into our economy. There are not only negative employment implications but also national security implications," Tanjusay warned.

TUCP said that the foreign workers are going into strategic industries that are of public interest and have national security implications. 

Tanjusay said that with unemployment at 10%, "this surrender of jobs to Chinese is just going to make worse the plight of Filipino workers who can do the job that Chinese are being given in our own country."

A Social Weathers Stations survey report released earlier this week suggests that adult joblessness was at 39.5%, about 23.7 million adult Filipinos. The figure is lower than 27.3 million estimated in a similar SWS survey in July 2020.

The Sentro ng Nagkakaisa at Progresibong Manggagawa (Sentro) also welcomed the Senate probe but stressed the call is not out of discrimination against undocumented Chinese workers.

"We would certainly welcome that (the probe) to ascertain the truth and determine how best the country can protect migrant workers here — documented or undocumented. But such probes must look at all nationalities and not just Chinese. We can't be a party to a racist initiative," Josua Mata, secretary general of Sentro, said.

"I think our immediate response must come from the perspective of protecting the rights and welfare of foreign nationals working in our country — documented or undocumented. We need to make sure they are given the standards provided by the Labor Code. We need to show the world that we are doing exactly what we demand for our own OFWs abroad — providing them equal protection," Mata added.

Gerard Seno, national executive vice president of the Associated Labor Unions said, "facing exploitation and abuse, these hidden undocumented workers often work in inhumane conditions and zero legal protection."

He added that they welcome the Senate probe on all 'foreign' workers as a way for the nation to once and for all make these invisible workers visible and extend to them the full protection of Philippine labor laws. - Artemio Dumlao (Philstar.com) 

TUCP urges for massive job generation in the President's legacy projects to ease the COVID-19 triggered unemployment and poverty

On the President's 5th SONA

The Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP) urges for massive job generation to be included in the President’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) on Monday, July 27, 2020, to ease the COVID-19 triggered unemployment and poverty citing the President’s legacy projects, particularly in the P35.91 billion 102-km Mindanao Railway Project (MRP), Tagum-Davao-Digos segment as having great potential for employment and development.

“The Mindanao Railway Project of the President, although a single-track diesel-run railway, has great potential to generate the much-needed jobs. It will benefit not just the workers in Tagum-Davao-Digos areas but from as far as BARMM, Regions X, XII and CARAGA if agri-industrial hubs will be developed and connected to the planned eight (8) stations which are in Tagum; Carmen; Panabo; Mundiang; Davao Terminal; Toril; Sta Cruz; and Digos,” TUCP Partylist and TUCP President Raymond Democrito C. Mendoza pointed out.

The Department of Transportation (DOTr) had earlier reported that the MRP’s Tagum-Davao-Digos segment’s design and construction will start in third quarter of this year and are expected to be completed by end of 2021.

“We do not need to reinvent the wheel or embark on new grand plans to create jobs, we just have to ensure that the ‘Build, Build, Build’ and the legacy projects of the President would be for the development and industrialization in the countryside to spur employment, and not just mere rail tracks, widened and asphalted roads,” Mendoza explained. “The President’s SONA should direct the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), Department of Science and Technology (DOST), DOLE, DOTr and Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) to ensure job creation,” he suggested.

The TUCP earlier projected 5 million to 10 million unemployed workers due to the pandemic, and 3 to 4 million in floating status under a “no work, no pay” arrangement, while the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported a 17.7 percent unemployment rate which accounts for 7.3 million unemployed in the workforce in the second quarter of 2020, nearly a four-time increase from the 5.1 percent unemployment rate in the same quarter of 2019.

The PSA also reported double-digit unemployment rates in all regions, the highest was in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM) at 29.8 percent. The rest of the regions in Mindanao island: Region IX registered an unemployment rate of 23.9 percent, Region X at 11.1 percent, Region XI at 17.9 percent, Region XII at 21.2 percent and CARAGA at 12.3 percent.

The SWS survey conducted in May 2020 noted that eighty-three percent of Filipinos believe that their quality of life has worsened in the last 12 months. The survey has 294 respondents from Metro Manila, 1,645 from Balance Luzon, 792 from Visayas, and 1,279 from Mindanao. While a separate SWS survey in the same period showed that 16.7 percent or an estimated 4.2 million Filipino families experienced involuntary hunger at least once for the past three months.

"We reiterate our call to the Government on the urgency to respond to the magnitude of the displacement of workers. Indeed, some companies are operating but it will get worse before it will get better. Companies are operating in half capacities to finish the pre-pandemic job orders and there are no new orders coming in as the economies of our markets abroad are in recession. Closures will come in the fourth quarter of the year with no assurance of rebound in 2021. There is no assurance of foreign remittance as our OFWs are coming home and those who stayed overseas have no jobs while our seafarers have become quarantine costly and unable to board the ships on time due to bottlenecks in the green lanes. It should not be ‘business-as-usual’ mode, we need to have a massive job creation program or a Philippine Agri-Industrial Development Program to stimulate the economy, and not rely on labor export or foreign investments,” TUCP Vice President Luis Corral said.

He also pointed out that this is President Duterte’s golden opportunity to “BUILD BACK BETTER” using the country’s “AAA-minus credit rating” to fund a multi-trillion-peso economic stimulus package so that the credit rating is felt by the Filipino people.

- TUCP Labor Center