Gov’t workers join call for P16,000 monthly national minimum wage

MANILA, Philippines—Government employees have taken up the call for a P16,000 monthly national minimum wage for all workers, both in the public and private sectors, according to officials of their organization.

This demand is at the heart of a nationwide protest planned by the All Workers Unity (AWU) coalition on Nov. 20, a central action for which will be a noontime “walkout” by members of the Confederation for Unity, Recognition and Advancement of Government Employees (Courage) in Metro Manila.

Government workers in the area are to walk out of their offices during lunchtime and gather at the Elliptical Road in Quezon City on Thursday, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Employees’ associations in various government agencies will also express their support through the hanging of streamers in their offices to raise the call for a higher minimum wage, a spokesman said.

INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

Private-sector workers, under the Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU), will also be at the lead of the nationwide protests. Other members of the AWU include the Alliance of Concerned Teachers and the Alliance of Health Workers (AGH).

At a press conference on Monday in Quezon City announcing the activities, Courage national president Ferdinand Gaite and KMU secretary-general Roger Soluta explained that their proposed P16,000 monthly minimum wage was based on the P1,086 daily Family Living Wage or cost of living estimated by independent think-tank Ibon Foundation as of August 2014.

Ibon Foundation defines the Family Living Wage as the minimum amount needed by a family of six members to meet its daily food and non-food needs, plus a 10 percent allocation for savings.

The current monthly minimum wage for private-sector workers in Metro Manila is P10,252, while the minimum monthly wage for government workers is P9,000.

To arrive at their proposed monthly minimum wage, the AWU multiplied Ibon Foundation’s FLW by 30, then halved it.

“We think it is only right and just, and it even still falls short. But for now, it can lift the living conditions of workers,” Gaite said.

Gaite said the proposed national minimum wage would bring “immediate relief” to Filipinos suffering from worsening hunger and poverty.

“In the fight for higher minimum wages, the highest that workers have been able to get is only half of the living wage. For a family of five to six, the living wage is now at P1,086 a day. So in Metro Manila alone, the minimum wage is not even half of the living wage,” Gaite said.

Gaite added that the daily minimum wage rate in Metro Manila for private workers, at P466, is already the highest among the minimum wage rates nationwide. The minimum wage for government employees is set at P9,000 monthly, which is still not half of the FLW, Gaite said.

According to a 2011 statement by the Ibon Foundation posted on its website, the last time minimum wages in Metro Manila reached at least half of a family’s cost of living was in 2001, when the daily minimum wage of P265 was half of the family living wage at P509.

Soluta said the Wage Rationalization Law of 1989, setting the minimum wage per region, has “fragmented” the country’s minimum wage so much that there are currently around 1,000 wage levels in the entire country.

Before the Wage Rationalization law, the government had implemented since 1951 a national minimum wage for workers in the private sector, the AWU said, in a statement.

Also present at AWU’s press conference on Monday were representatives from employees’ associations of the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority, the Department of Social Welfare and Development, the National Food Authority, the Department of Agriculture, and the National Housing Authority; and the Judiciary Employees Association.

Gaite said Courage has already gathered the support of various employees’ associations of national and local government agencies and offices, courts, state corporations and even water concessionaires in Metro Manila, southern Mindanao, Baguio, Bacolod and Iloilo.

RELATED STORY

Gov’t workers lost bonuses to DAP