BAGUIO CITY – The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) is set to issue an order that will curb the mandatory use of high-heeled shoes by women employees in the workplaces, and implementing the provision of the Labor Code that ensures the safety and health of women employees.
In Administrative Order No. 368, Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III formed a technical working group that will study the effects of and draw up measures to regulate the wearing of women’s high-heeled shoes in the workplace.
The same directive mandates the TWG to devise means to enforce Article 132 of the Labor Code to “establish standards that will ensure the safety and health of women employees.”
The law empowers the labor secretary to require any employer to “provide seats proper for women and permit them to use such seats when they are free from work and during working hours, provided they can perform their duties in this position without detriment to efficiency.”
The move was prompted by complaints that salesladies in department stores and similar establishments across the country are made to stand for the duration of their duty which, Bello said, is detrimental to the health of the employees.
A labor group also called the attention of the labor department on the mandatory use of high heels by women employees in workplaces.
The working group, which will recommend a set of rules, is chaired by Undersecretary Dominador Say, with Bureau of Working Conditions Director Teresita Cucueco and Occupational Safety and Health Center Executive Director Noel Binag as members.
The group, which will also take in inputs from other offices and agencies of DOLE, will have until August 22 to submit its recommendations.
By DOLE release
