DOLE to hold labor summit tomorrow

The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) is holding a labor summit tomorrow in a bid to resolve concerns on contractualization and other labor issues, an official said yesterday.

Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III said they expect the summit to serve as a venue for the government and the workers to discuss contentious labor issues.

“There are several issues which need to be clarified and resolved immediately with the labor groups such as contractualization and illegal recruitment,” Bello said.

The summit will be held at the Occupational Safety and Health Center in Quezon City.

Bello said the summit would give the labor sector an opportunity to craft a unified proposal on the issue of contractualization.

“The position of the labor groups is not unified, unlike the management group, which had presented a win-win proposal on contratualization,” he explained.

After the labor summit, Bello said the DOLE would come out with a policy on how to address contractualization.

Last September, the management groups presented a win-win proposal for businesses and workers in order to put a stop on end-of-contract or “endo” schemes.

The proposal has two options. First, the company will hire the workers directly and second is for the principal or the company to outsource workers from service providers. The service providers will hire workers and they will have the direct employer-employee relationship.

Labor groups, however, rejected the proposed win-win solution, which they claimed favors management.

With the labor summit, Bello said they hope to gather inputs from the workers for the implementation of labor and employment strategies, policies, programs and activities that would support efforts in translating the government’s eight-point policy agenda.