18 senators adopt reso on PH-Japan social security deal

Eighteen senators voted to adopt on Monday a resolution concurring in the ratification of a social security agreement between the Philippines and Japan.

Senate President Pro-Tempore Franklin Drilon, cosponsor of Senate resolution 283, said the agreement, which was signed on November 19, 2015 and ratified last January 12, 201, would benefit an estimated 377,233 Filipinos in Japan and 17,021 Japanese nationals currently in the country.

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It sought to protect the social security rights of overseas Filipinos in Japan to enable them to have access to social security benefits, including sickness, maternity, paternity, occupational diseases, invalidity, old age and survivor’s pension, Drilon said.

The senator noted that overseas Filipino workers face territorial or nationality-based restrictions, which deny them access to social security benefits. Many receiving states, he said, do not cover foreign workers under their social security schemes, leaving Filipino workers with no access to basic safety nets while working abroad.

Drilon said many employers also face the risk of dual coverage or payment of double contributions when they send workers on a temporary basis to another country.

“Labor protection should take the frontline in this age of globalization. We must take steps to guarantee the full protection of our workers here and abroad,” Drilon said.

Senator Alan Peter Cayetano, another author of the resolution, said the agreement sought to coordinate the pension programs for people who live or work in the Philippines and Japan wherein those covered by their respective social security systems would continue to receive the benefits due them whether they reside in the Philippines, Japan or elsewhere.

“Upon the entry into force of this agreement, employees temporarily dispatched for a period of five years or less to the other country will be covered by the pension system of the country from which these employees were dispatched,” Cayetano, chairman of the Senate committee on foreign affairs, said.

The agreement, he said, would also enable the establishment of eligibility to receive pension in each country by totalizing the period of the coverage in both countries.

“Employees who have divided their careers between the Philippines and Japan will no longer be required to pay pension premiums in both countries, and their contribution in one jurisdiction may be considered as contribution to the other,” Cayetano said. RAM/rga