Minimum-wage earners in four regions of the country will soon get pay hikes after their respective regional wage boards separately issued new wage increase orders.
In an ambush interview on Tuesday, Labor Undersecretary Ciriaco A. Lagunzad III announced the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Boards (RTWPB) in Central Luzon, Central Visayas, Zamboanga Peninsula and Davao region have already raised their wage rates for this year.
The new wage order for Central Luzon will take effect on August 1, 2018, and will grant workers there a P20 daily wage hike. The smallest minimum-wage rate in the region is now P274 for retail or service firms with less than 16 workers in the province of Aurora, while its biggest pay of P400 are for workers in nonagriculture firms with assets worth P30 million or more.
The RTWPB’s in the three other regions have yet to publish their wage orders.
“It will take 15 days after the publication before their respective wage orders to be effective,” Lagunzad told reporters.
But once their wage orders take effect, minimum-wage earners in their jurisdictions will get the following rates: Central Visayas (P313 to P386); Zamboanga region (P303 to P316); and Davao region (P381.43 to P396.43).
Lagunzad said workers in the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) and the Bicol region will also soon get their much-awaited pay increase.
“RTWPBs CAR and [Region] 5…are expected to issue wage orders within the month of July and August 2018,” Lagunzad said.
He added the RTWPB-CAR already completed their consultations and public hearing, while RTWPB Region 5 is expected to complete its board deliberations by August 14.
Meanwhile, Lagunzad said, the RTWPBs in Metro Manila, Ilocos region, Cagayan Valley, Mimaropa, Northern Mindanao and Caraga Region have yet to start their deliberations since they are still waiting for the anniversary date of their wage orders.
Except for the RTWPB in the Ilocos regions, all of the said regions issued their wage orders in 2017.
The RTWPB in Ilocos region issued its latest wage order on November 24, 2017, but it only took effect on January 25, 2018.
Lagunzad said the six RTWPBs are monitoring the socioeconomic conditions to determine if they will be declaring a so-called supervening condition.
Under the Wage Rationalization Act, RTWPBs could only grant new wage orders a year after the effectivity of their previous wage issuance.
An RTWPB may be exempted from this rule if they declare a supervening event, which is any unusual spike in the prices of basic commodities and services in their areas for a certain period.
As of Tuesday, Lagunzad said no RTWPB has declared any supervening event.
Currently, only the RTWPBs in Calabarzon, Eastern Visayas, Western Visayas, Soccsksargen and the Autonomous Regions in Muslim Mindanao have issued their wage orders.
Meager increases
The Associated Labor Union-Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP), however, slammed the latest of round of wage hikes, stating the increases are still insufficient for the needs of workers.
“These amounts fails to push minimum-waged workers and their families out of poverty caused by very high inflation,” ALU-TUCP Spokesman Alan Tanjusay said.
The labor leader said none of the pay increase will allow minimum-wage earners to receive the P42,000 monthly income prescribed by the National Economic and Development Authority for a family of five. More so, Tanjusay said, amid the unexpected increase in the inflation rate, which reached 5.2 percent in March.
ALU-TUCP has been calling on the government to grant workers nationwide a P320 minimum-wage increase and cash subsidies to allow them to cope with the rising cost of living.
For his part, Partido Manggagawa National Chairman Renato Magtubo agreed with Tanjusay, saying that the RTWPBs have failed in their mandate in granting workers a significant wage hike.
“Once again, the regional wage boards proved themselves as inutile mechanism in addressing the demand for wage increase that could tide workers and their families against the rising prices of basic commodities,” Magtubo said.
He reiterated his call to President Duterte to scrap the “provincial wage rates” and implement a uniform national minimum wage rate.
Image credits: Nonie Reyes