Palace wants labor contractualization reduced in 6 months

MANILA, Philippines – The Duterte administration wants to significantly reduce labor contractualization within its first six months in office and fast-track the processing of requirements for setting up a business.

Presidential spokesman Ernesto Abella said the two topics were discussed during a Cabinet meeting held last Monday in Malacañang.

“DOLE (Department of Labor and Employment) has committed to reduce ‘endo’ (end of contract) contractualization within six months (by) a considerable amount,” Abella told reporters yesterday.

The Department of Trade and Industry, for its part, vowed to reduce the number of days to “register a business to three days or ideally one day,” Abella said. 

Ending contractualization and easing the requirements for investors were among the campaign promises of President Duterte, who won by a landslide in the May 9 polls with 16.6 million votes.

Duterte has described labor contractualization as “anti-people” and has promised to work with Congress to put an end to the practice.

Duterte said he would not compromise because he was worried about how much an ordinary worker was earning.

Some employers do not regularize their employees because it will require them to spend more on overtime, holiday and 13th month pay and social security benefits.

Article 13, Section 2 of the 1987 Constitution states that employees are entitled to security of tenure, a living wage and humane working conditions.

It also requires the state to “afford full protection to labor, local and overseas, organized and unorganized and promote full employment and equality of employment opportunities for all.”

With regard to simplifying business processes, Duterte had said that all public documents should be released within three days.

Abella said Duterte reiterated the need to do away with red tape during the Cabinet meeting.

“As directed by the President, all agencies are to stop red tape in their agencies and to stop people from queuing up and ideally to do away or to shift to appointments in order to be able to come back for your requirements,” Abella said.

Abella also noted that businessmen were clamoring for the implementation of national identification (ID) system, a measure that some critics claimed could lead to invasion of privacy.?“The proposal for national ID came from the business sector. During the business conference in Davao, there was a clamor for that. Surprisingly, it was a top clamor,” the presidential spokesman said.

“It did not come from the President. It’s really a clamor from the business sector. Apparently, it will facilitate better business processes and everything,” he added.