TRAIN to add P.08/kWh to Meralco bill starting Feb.
The full impact of the new Tax Reform Inclusion and Acceleration (TRAIN) Act on electricity rates for the year will amount to 8 centavos per kilowatt-hour (kWh), an official of the Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) said. “If we use November 2017 dispatch levels…excise tax of coal and oil is around 1 centavo, while the VAT [value-added tax] on transmission charge is 7 centavos. The total is 8 centavos. That is the full impact for Meralco customers this year,” Meralco Utility Head Economics Lawrence Fernandez said.
He added this will probably be reflected in the February bills of Meralco customers.
Peza zones must now follow occupational safety standards
The labor department has cut off its labor-safety agreement with the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza) that allows economic zones to only voluntarily comply with occupational safety and health standards.
In a news briefing on Tuesday, Presidential Spokesman Harry L. Roque Jr. said the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) decided to revoke its agreement with the Peza due to the two deadly fires in economic zones last year. The two fires—the House Technology Industries Ltd. (HTI) fire in General Trias, Cavite, and the NCCC Mall fire in Davao City, both Peza-accredited zones—claimed the lives of dozens of workers, most of whom were trapped inside the burning establishments.
Under the DOLE’s Manual on Labor Laws Compliance System and Procedures for Uniform Implementation, labor regional directors were instructed to coordinate with his or her Peza counterpart an economic zone-wide evaluation of voluntary compliance with occupational safety and health standards. The provision is pursuant to the memorandum of agreement signed between the DOLE and Peza in 2006.
As stipulated in the manual, assessment of economic zones can be carried out through an industry-wide joint assessment, which is headed by the DOLE. However, this can be sidelined in favor of the economic zone, and the assessment can be “organized differently depending on the peculiarity of the economic zone operations.”
Lenie Lectura and Elijah Felice E. Rosales