SC stops fixed salary scheme for bus firms

MANILA, Philippines - The Supreme Court (SC) has stopped the implementation of a government order fixing the salaries of bus drivers and conductors starting this month.

The high court issued yesterday a status quo ante order, enjoining the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) and Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) from implementing the new salary scheme and allowing the bus companies to go back to their previous salary schemes pending the resolution of the case.

DOLE-National Capital Region director Alan Macaraya, however, said they will file a motion to lift the SC order preventing them from inspecting all 158 bus firms operating in Metro Manila to ensure their compliance with the new policy.

“We will have to respect the order of the SC and stop our inspection, but the Office of the Solicitor General is preparing a motion defending the fixed wage policy for bus companies,” he said.

Macaraya said five of the 158 bus firms have complied with the policy, “so we do not see the reason why the other firms cannot do so.”

Aside from giving bus drivers and conductors fixed salaries not lower than the applicable minimum wage rate, the new DOLE regulation also mandates bus operators to provide them with 12 regular holidays with pay, one rest day a week, overtime pay, night shift pay and 13th month pay.

The drivers and conductors are also entitled to the normal eight hours of work a day, right to security of tenure, right to self organization and collective bargaining, and access to social welfare benefits including Social Security System, Philhealth, and Pag-ibig.

Temporary relief

In a press conference, SC spokesperson Ma. Victoria Gleoresty Guerra said justices agreed in full-court session there is legal basis and urgency to grant the temporary relief sought in the petition filed by several bus firms last week.

She explained that the status quo ante order will have the same effect as a temporary restraining order, which enjoins implementation of a government policy.

“The effect is that the bus companies will have to go back to their old arrangement being implemented before the issuance of the DOLE and LTFRB orders,” she told reporters.

Guerra also stressed that the bus companies which already implemented the new scheme would have to pay their drivers and conductors their salaries and commissions – under the previous arrangement – in the past 10 days since implementation of the orders.

She said the high tribunal also directed DOLE and LTFRB officials to answer the petition filed by the Provincial Bus Operators Association of the Philippines, Southern Luzon Bus Operators Association Inc., Inter-city Bus Operators Association and City of San Jose Del Monte Bus Operators Association within 10 days from receipt of notice.

In a 24-page petition filed last July 4, the bus firms asked the high court to stop implementation of DOLE’s Department Order No. 118-12 and LTFRB Memorandum Circular No. 2012-001 for allegedly violating Article 3, Section 10 of the Constitution.

‘Previous arrangement better’

Petitioners argued that the orders compel bus operators to abandon their existing hiring arrangements, such as “payment by results or on commissions basis, or by incentives ” or even existing collective bargaining agreements or such other practices that have not been prohibited by law.

They stressed that such arrangements had, in many instances, proven to be more advantageous to bus drivers and operators.

They said implementation of the said order and issuances, according to petitioners, are also tantamount to undue interference of the government in purely private or business matters involving solely private parties. - With Mayen Jaymalin