According to a report by Silvestre Bello III, Secretary of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), more than 10,000 contractual workers across the country have already become regularized by the companies they work for.
This, of course, is in initial response to the call by President Rodrigo Duterte to eliminate the practice of contractualization in the country. With the help of DOLE, the current administration is hoping to decrease illegitimate contractualization up to 50% by the end of 2016 and its total elimination by 2017.
“We continue to encourage employers to voluntarily regularize workers, who are under labor-only contracting arrangements,” Bello said during a press conference.
SM and 7-Eleven are among the big companies that voluntarily heeded the President’s call to regularize their employees. There are, however, many other companies that are not as responsive to the new initiative.
Bello mentioned that some companies have already received the cease-and-desist orders (CDOs) from DOLE which is “already a form of sanction.” Receiving a CDO means a company will have to cease with their operations or that an agency or manpower service will have to stop deploying people. So far, seven companies have received CDOs from the department including 5 in Calabarzon, 1 in Metro Manila, and 1 in Central Luzon.
“All regional offices have been directed to suspend the Certificates of Registration of establishments found violating the law of security of tenure,” the Labor Chief likewise warned.
This news is, of course, very much well-received by the general public, especially by individuals who used to work as contractual workers. While DOLE still definitely has a long way to go before they can fulfill their goal, many are happy that they are taking big steps towards the right direction and have already achieved a lot in just a short span of time.