INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
The Senate approved on Friday an allocation of nearly P17 billion, including more than P1 billion to its original proposal, as the first budget of the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW), which was created last year.
The House of Representatives in September approved a budget of P15.2 billion and the difference in the two versions is expected to be resolved in the bicameral conference committee on the government’s 2023 spending program.
The new department, headed by longtime labor advocate Susan Ople, initially proposed a maiden budget of P16.09 billion, but the Senate earmarked an additional P1.15 billion.
The Overseas Workers Welfare Administration, an attached agency of the DMW will get the lion’s share of P11.77 billion.The Department of Migrant Workers Act (Republic Act No. 11641) created the new agency last year and consolidated the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration with seven offices of the Department of Labor and Employment (Dole) and Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA).
The absorbed offices were the DFA’s Office for Migrant Workers’ Affairs and the Dole’s Philippine Overseas Labor Office, International Labor Affairs Bureau, National Reintegration Center for OFWs and the National Maritime Polytechnic. INQ
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