2004
FFW ANNUAL REPORT ON NORM
Attn:
Bro. Rekson Silaban, Norm ASEAN Coordinator
In compliance with your request,
herein appended is the Report of FFW on the Philippines concerning
compliance to labour standards set by the ILO.
We point out that the appended
report was prepared and adopted by a tripartite body: The preparation
was made by a tripartite Decent Work Technical Working Group that
was later (in May 2002) adopted by the National Tripartite Advisory
Council of the ILO-Department of Labor and Employment’s
(DOLE) Decent Work Programme for the Philippines. The FFW is one
of two labor federations in the country who are members of both
the national tripartite body and the technical working group of
this ILO-supported tripartite Programme on Decent Work.
In conjunction, FFW is also a
member of the multi-partite body, both at the technical working
group level and national body that implements IPEC-supported programs
and projects to combat child labor in general and to eliminate
the worst forms of child labor in particular, in which respect,
the FFW is currently implementing an IPEC-supported project to
eliminate the worst forms of child labor in Diwalwal - a gold
panning community - and child domestic workers- particularly those
employed by trade union members.
Some updates: in late 2003, a
Tripartite Consultation adopted a Resolution to campaign for the
Philippine Senate’s (upper house) ratification of Conventions
relating to Migrant Workers (C. 143, on The Migrant Workers’
Convention [ Supplementary Provision]., 1975). Further, in July
2004, the same tripartite body discussed and recommended to the
Secretary of Labor and Employment the promulgation of Rules and
Regulations implementing a statutory law on the elimination of
Child Labour.
Since 2001, the FFW is one of
the several national labor federations who are members of this
tripartite body and who actively participated in the shaping of
both documents. FFW has also been an active participant in campaigning
for the passage of a law entitled “Magna Carta for Domestic
(Household) Helpers”, to promote the rights of Domestic
Helpers and improve their working conditions as well as their
economic and social status.
It is emphasized that FFW’s
active and concrete involvement in promoting international labor
standards is only one of the four pillars of Decent Work Programme
for the Philippines, which FFW decided as its National Convention
theme in 2001 and which it pursued further by joining the tripartite
effort to promote Decent Work in the Philippines. The other three
pillars are employment generation, social protection and social
dialogue. In all these areas, not only is FFW active in lobbying
for laws, public policy and programs; it is also involved in concrete
pilot projects and continuing programs that aims to improve the
employability of workers at large and displaced members in particular,
in putting up mutual aid and protection for its members as well
as in setting up legal defense and trade union education for them,
and in promoting the use of social dialogue in all its endeavors,
be it in collective bargaining, social negotiations, tripartite
meetings and conferences and multi-partite summits and public
policy-framing exercises.
From experience, we observe that
the work to promote Norms can not be isolated specifically from
campaigns to alter the course of globalization in general and
to reform global institutions, in particular the world and regional
trading and investment bodies, the international and continental
financial institutions and the transnational corporations. Government
and employers are reluctant to engage labour in serious social
dialogue on the single issues of labour standards in face of harrowing
global competition precipitated by international trade, investments
and finance.
Despite advances in national compliance
to international labour standards, globalization as manifested
in its three policy pillars – liberalization, deregulation
and privatization – continue to wreak havoc on workers and
their unions in four ways: displacement, flexibilization, informalization
and unprotected external migration.
We observe from experience that
the dynamics of globalization in hot pursuit for corporate survival
and profits occasioned by harsh global competition would tend
to make employers, global institutions on trading, investment
and finance as well as national governments to ignore international
labour standards or to relegate these to minor concerns. It seems
that neither national laws nor international standards are any
match to continuing corporate acquisitions, mergers and strategic
corporate alliances, resulting, among others, in human resource
development practices that either bust or avoid unionism and collective
bargaining. Thus, in practice, the trend to a social race to the
bottom continues unabated.
We also observe that governments,
particularly democratic governments in developed countries, who
want to curry favor from workers and unions during elections have
placed in the forefront of their political platforms the protection
and preservation of jobs in their respective countries. Even in
the context of combating international terrorism, trade and job
protectionism has not abated, although job protectionism in particular
is re-appearing with new clothes, particularly in respect to the
growing trend of regionalism in Europe, Asia and everywhere else.
We thus propose for all of us
to find ways and means to join and coordinate manifold activities
at global, regional, national and workplace levels particularly
in relations to global trading and investment bodies, IFIs and
TNCs.
In very concrete terms, activities
at the global level will have to be expanded and coordinated to
continue lobbying and engaging the IFIs, in promoting social charters
among regional trading blocks, in making use of the OECD Guidelines
for Multinational Corporations, as well as in supporting the Millennium
Development Goals and the Global Compact Initiative side by side
with campaigning for greater adherence and adoption of multinational
codes of conduct, social labeling and the like. The FFW made use
of the OECD Guidelines in the case of the Employees Union of Bayer-Philippines-FFW
(EUBP-FFW). The case involved anti-union discrimination and violation
of the right to free collective bargaining, when management of
Bayer-Philippines unilaterally recognized another trade union
in the company instead of the duly recognized EUBP-FFW.
Finally, we observe, from our
own experiences that ILO’s Decent Work Programme is a more
comprehensive framework for advancing the rights and interests
of workers and unions. However, the global program has not even
merit mention in the MDG or in any important policy document of
global and regional trading bodies and international financial
institutions. For example, the proposed social development policy
of the World Bank does not make any mention either of labor standards
but more so about decent Work.
Moreover, translating the global
decent work concept into a national reality becomes even harder
because ILO itself is deep in internal debate about the utility
of the concept and how it can be measured statistically in order
to monitor compliance by countries, in furthering its social aims
and goals. Even then, Decent Work in its four pillars and six
dimensions has become, at least in our experience, a more cohesive
framework for advocating economic and social development at our
level and in advancing both fundamental and core standards of
the ILO. A recent concrete experience on the effectiveness of
this framework is exemplified in the case of the FFW affiliate,
Ateneo De Davao University (ADDU) Union. ADDU Management and the
Union had disputes, involving illegal termination and other violations
of CBA provisions by the management. Parents of ADDU students,
the FFW as an organization and the general public expressed support
for the Union. Eventually, through social dialogue, one of the
pillars of Decent Work, a compromise agreement was reached. Among
the witnesses to the agreement was the City Mayor.
We hope to hear your comments
on the above proposal.
For FFW Norms (Philippines)
JOSE CAYOBIT
NT and Norms Coordinator
(Original Signed)
Cc: R. J. Jabar, National President, FFW
Members of the FFW Executive Committee and Governing Board
J. C. Tan, President BATU and President Emeritus, FFW
N. Lucero, BATU SG
5.Tunac, BATU-ASEAN WSM Coordinator
J. Dellaban, BAWC Coordinator
J. C. Welliamuna, NORM SAARC Coordinator
Isablelle Hoferlin, WCL
Thierry Manhaeghe, WSM
