Ending ‘endo’ is ‘doable,’ says Labor chief

LABOR Secretary Silvestre Bello III INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / MARIANNE BERMUDEZ

Putting an end to “endo,” or the end-of-contract scheme of employers, by 2017 may be a daunting task, but it is “doable,” Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III said on Tuesday.

In a news briefing in Malacañang, Bello said the Department of Labor and Employment (Dole) was keen on eradicating the unlawful and abusive labor-only contracting practice as promised by President Duterte.

At present, he said Dole’s intervention has resulted in the regularization of about 25,000 contractual workers, but this number was less than 10 percent of the total nonregular employees nationwide.

“The President’s instruction is very clear…The President said ‘no to endo’ and ‘no to contractualization…’ We have to comply because we might get killed,” Bello said in jest.

Asked if institutionalizing the Duterte administration’s no-contractualization policy was possible at end of 2017, he said: “I say it’s doable especially since we have the cooperation of the management.”

He described as “win-win solution” the proposal of the Department of Trade and Industry and business owners to order manpower agencies to “regularize” contractual employers they provide to companies. —MARLON RAMOS