Villanueva asks DBM to replenish funds for emergency employment programs

Sen. Joel Villanueva. PRIB Photo

MANILA, Philippines — Senator Joel Villanueva has called on the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) to replenish funds for the government’s emergency employment programs amid the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) placed over Luzon and other parts of the country.

“Our Bayanihan Law states that DOLE [Department of Labor and Employment] programs will be prioritized for budget augmentation, but it has only received about 16% of their total proposed funding requirement. We hope that our DBM augment the coffers of DOLE so it could continue its emergency employment programs,” the lawmaker said Saturday in a statement.

The emergency employment programs cater to displaced workers in the formal and informal sectors, as well as overseas Filipino workers (OFW), who are affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Villanueva, chair of the Senate Committee on Labor, Employment, and Human Resource Development, noted that DOLE’s programs have so far only received P1.5 billion from the proposed P7.8 billion funding requirement.

“If the proposed P7.8 billion could not be fully granted at this time, we hope the government can spare whatever funds it has for DOLE to continue providing the much-needed assistance for the workers whose companies have already applied for CAMP [COVID-19 Adjustment Measures Program] benefits as of April 15,” he said.

“We should continue to be compassionate and swift in helping our workers survive the pandemic, especially since it would impose additional hardship for those who already applied, but unable to get CAMP benefits, to reapply again with DOF or DSWD, as the case may be,” the lawmaker added.

Villanueva pointed out that the department “has yet to make significant headway into meeting its target number of beneficiaries for CAMP,” the support program for workers in the formal sector. DOLE announced Wednesday it was suspending the program for lack of funds.

“DOLE-CAMP should be allowed [to] continue so it could improve its reach. We have confidence in our economic team that it would be able to find a way to replenish the coffers of the labor department,” the senator said. “We hope that the suspension of CAMP is just temporary.”

Citing a report from DOLE, Villanueva said the department targeted some 540,000 workers to benefit from CAMP. As of April 13, however, the program has only attained 31% or 167,94 of its target beneficiaries, as mentioned in Duterte’s third report to Congress on the Bayanihan Law.

Meanwhile, DOLE’s Tulong Panghanapbuhay sa Ating Displaced/Disadvantaged Workers (TUPAD) program for workers from the informal sector has only reached 17% of its target of 700,000 beneficiaries.

Villanueva likewise pushed for the continuous processing of CAMP applications even if it is on break. He further urged the agency to address reports of some DOLE regional offices imposing requirements outside of the program’s guidelines.

For one, the senator said an office in the Visayas was reportedly requiring CAMP applicants to state the educational attainment of workers in one of the necessary forms while another office allegedly asked employers to submit signed payroll slips.

Villanueva also said his office has received a complaint from a CAMP applicant that has applied since March 19 but which employees have yet to receive the promised P5,000 assistance from DOLE.

“We ask [Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III] to look into these reports and prevail on field offices to remove unnecessary requirements so we can expedite the assistance to our workers,” Villanueva said.

KGA