BAGUIO CITY – The Cordillera office of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE-CAR) disclosed that more than ninety three percent of the operating establishments in the different parts of the region are compliant to the general labor standards prescribed under existing laws, rules and regulations which is an indication of a good partnership between labor and management.
DOLE-Car assistant regional director lawyer Anthony Wooden, Jr. claimed that for this year, labor inspectors were able to inspect some 780 businesses in the different parts of the region on their compliance to the general labor standards such as the payment of the prevailing minimum wage, payment of contributions with the different agencies, payment of overtime and holiday pays and other mandatory compensation for the employees prescribed under the Labor Code of the Philippines.
On the other hand, Wooden reported that 77.05 of the inspected establishments are compliant to the prevailing occupational safety and health standards to ensure the safety and health protection of their workers while in their respective workplaces.
He pointed out that the implementation of occupational safety and health standards is anchored on the pertinent provisions of Republic Act (RA) 11058 that seeks to strengthen the compliance of both the government and the private sector to occupational safety and health practices that will prevent the occurrence of untoward incidents that might compromise the safety and health of the workers.
The DOLE-CAR official explained that the top 5 violations committed by employers based on the results of their inspections are underpayment of wages, underpayment or non-payment of overtime pay, underpayment or non-payment of holiday pay, underpayment or non-payment of rest day premium and underpayment or non-payment of night shift differential In terms of occupational safety and health, he revealed that the top 4 violations committed by employers are the absence of occupational safety and health program, lack of safety officers, lack of first aiders, lack of first aid kits and that the establishments are not registered with the labor department as mandated under the Occupational Safety and Health law.
According to him, the establishment must make sure that the assigned safety and health officers and first aiders must be on site at all times to ensure that they will be able to effectively and efficiently respond to situations calling for their immediate action.
Wooden called on employers to strictly comply with the pertinent provisions of the Labor Code to prevent the agency from issuing to them notices of violation and that they should not wait for inspectors to conduct an inspection on their establishment as they will surely chance upon them in their ongoing inspections regionwide.
Last year, the DOLE-CAR was able to inspect some 1716 establishments for their compliance to the general labor standards and the occupational safety and health.
On the compliance of establishments to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) health and safety protocols, Wooden claimed that last year, the agency was able to issue some 8 Safety Seal Certificates while there were already 6 Safety Seal Certificates that were issued by the DOLE-CAR for this year alone.
