DOLE orients tripartite council on occupational safety and health

September 25, 2018 Provincial

LAGAWE, IFUGAO – To promote tripartism in the province as a state policy in Labor-Management relations, personnel of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) here oriented members of the Provincial Tripartite Council (PTIPC) from the construction, businesses, cooperative, labor and educational sectors on occupational safety at the work sites.
Joseph Tuguinay of DOLE-Ifugao said activity endeavors to strengthen and ensure that workers and employers as far as practicable are represented in various decision and policy-making bodies of the government, improve productivity through an enhanced understanding of fair employment and appreciation on DOLE’s advocacy to stop labor contractualization and promote safety and health of workers.
It was also a venue for social dialogues and tripartite consultations on Occupational Safety and Health programs, notes in the application for Construction Safety Health Program under Department Order No. 174-17, Wage Order No. 19 and others affecting labor and management.
Senior Labor and Employment Officer Isabelita Codamon discussed Occupational Safety and Health stressing its salient features such as the importance of safety and health in the workplace involving accident, unsafe condition, unsafe acts and their impacts and effects including the responsibilities of the workers and employers.
She also explained Department Order No. 174-17 governing government contracting and sub-contracting arrangements and the types of employees such as the regular, seasonal, casual, project-based and probationary.
Contracting and contractors are legal but must register according to the law since they carry a distinct and independent business to undertake and perform a job, work or service on its own responsibility according to its own manner and method and free from the control and direction of the principal in all matters connected with the performance of the work except as to the result, she explained.
On the other hand, sub-contracting or labor-only contracting is illegal and must be discouraged and stopped since the contractor does not have substantial capital or investments but which the employees recruited are performing activities which are usually necessary or desirable to the operation of the company or directly related to the main business of the principal within a definite or pre-determined period.
Codamon also informed about Wage Order No. 19 prescribing the new minimum wage rate of workers in the private sectors in the Cordillera Region amounting to P315/day for those companies employing 11 and more workers and P300/day for those employing 10 and below number of employees.
In Ifugao, the minimum wage rate for workers in Banaue and Lamut is P315/day while P300/day for the rest of the towns of Ifugao.
New set of PTIPC officers was also elected after the orientation. DBC, PIA-Ifugao / ABN