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LABOR groups are taking advantage of the ?season of giving? in hopes of gaining a more favorable decision on a petition for a wage increase that was earlier rejected.
The Cebu Labor Coalition has refiled its petition for a P128.60 across-the-board wage increase with the Regional Tripartite Wage and Productivity Board (RTWPB), a proposal that was first filed last October, but was rejected due to missing signatures and computation attachments.
The petition was refiled last Tuesday.
Cebu Labor Coalition spokesman Boboy Belarmino said the group hoped that the board could take up the petition before they take a break for Christmas.
?The season of giving may have a good effect on the board?s decision,? Belarmino said.
However, Elias Cayanong, director of the Department of Labor and Employment in Central Visayas and chairman of the RTWPB, said he had not yet seen the refiled petition.
Since the board had already taken a recess for the Christmas and New Year holidays, Cayanong said the petition would likely be taken up first week of January when the board meets for the first time in 2010.
Belarmino said he was counting on Cayanong to give the petition priority next year.
?Listening to the needs of workers is a good way to start the year,? Belarmino said.
Cayanong said the board would have to check first if the Cebu Labor Coalition was able correct the deficiencies cited in the first petition.
?It must go through the process of studying trends, cost of living, cost of money, market and employment condition,? Cayanong said.
The Cebu Labor Coalition, which is composed of nine labor groups, justified the wage increase petition on 11 grounds: insufficient increases in the past, the reduction of the purchasing power of the peso, unstable oil prices, price hike in basic commodities, the consumer price index, inflation rates, new taxes and hikes in old ones, effects of globalization, increase in transportation fare, and increase in utility rates.
The present minimum wage of P267 a day is far below the P867 that the National Economic Development Authority earlier cited as the ideal, Belarmino said.
