As the House of Representatives’ Committee on Labor and Employment drags its feet on the legislated wage hike after already three hearings, the National Wage Coalition, spearheaded by the Bukluran ng Manggagawang Pilipino (BMP), Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU), Nagkaisa! Labor Coalition (NAGKAISA!), and Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP), demands the labor committee chaired by Rep. Fidel Nograles, to finally vote for the committee approval of the long-overdue and much-deserved wage increase in its next hearing on Wednesday, 15 May 2024.
After three exhaustive hearings where economists, academics, think tanks, civil societies, and workers themselves already demolished the fancied threats, myths, and lies of massive price spikes, joblessness, and business closures, the National Wage Coalition calls on the House Committee on Labor to now vote for the approval of the proposed legislated wage hike measures. With a significant majority of the members of the committee as co-authors such as in the ₱150 legislated across-the-board wage recovery increase by the TUCP, the National Wage Coalition trusts that the House of the People will heed the people’s pleas and accept the resounding truth that there is an imperative for Congress to raise workers' wages now after more than three decades of token increases and starvation wages under the regional wage board system.
Instead of the inadequate presidential order to review and reform regional minimum wage rates, the National Wage Coalition demands that President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. immediately certify urgent the legislated wage hike to fast-track its approval in the House of Representatives, considering that it is already passed in the Senate. The President must recognize that decades of insufficient increases from the regional wage boards must be set aside in favor of the legislated wage measures advanced by the united workers of the National Wage Coalition.
To be truly the House of the People, the National Wage Coalition demands Congress to raise the wages of all workers towards their right to a living wage, such as the P750 legislated wage hike by the Makabayan bloc through the legislated wage hike for private sector workers and a fair Salary Standardization Law to increase the minimum wage of public sector workers to ₱33,000. We call on the honorable members of the House of Representatives to co-author legislated wage hike measures and for the House Committee on Labor to immediately approve these measures and send them to the plenary for urgent deliberations and passage. For all the workers of this nation whose honest hard work creates the wealth of our nation, the National Wage Coalition forges ahead in our struggle to demand the end of senseless dribbling because all that needs to be said has been already said. The House of the People only needs to listen and heed the people's demand: DAGDAG SAHOD ISABATAS! ₱150 PATAAS!
National Wage Coalition
9 May 2024
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