Labor group hails creation of Department of Migrant Workers

The Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP) hailed the creation of the Department of Migrant Workers through SBN 2234 passed by the Senate and ratified by the House of Representatives during its last day of session on Dec 15, 2021.

TUCP President and Partylist Representative Raymond Democrito Mendoza was the principal author of HB 5832, the counterpart bill of the House of Representatives.

“This is a rightful Christmas gift for our OFWs and Seafarers, our modern heroes,” said Rep. Mendoza, Chairperson of the House Committee on Overseas Workers Affairs. “It is high time the Government honors their courage, dedication, and service to our country by establishing this new Department that responds to and elevates the status of OFWs,” Mendoza explained.

OFW personal remittances have kept the economy afloat before and during this pandemic. Their remittances are primarily allocated for basic goods and services, the education of their children, and are the real social safety net of our extended families.

These expenditures by OFW families have a multiplier effect that help generate local jobs. They generate valuable foreign currency reserves at almost no cost to government as it is these OFWs who are taking the cudgels of not just caring for their family, but also ensuring that our national balance of payment remains healthy.

“The pandemic highlighted the undramatic yet vital work of Filipino workers not just here, but in many parts of the world who risk life and limb just to earn an honest living. Filipino Migrant Workers have fought the great war on poverty, made great sacrifices at home and abroad, and made prodigious efforts to achieve personal and national wealth. Yet, they themselves languish in the uncertainties of a perilous and often fatal foreign labor market,” Mendoza said.

“Clearly, the pandemic has amplified the workers’ clamor for a far better government response to address unemployment, hunger and the growing outcry for more strategic and innovative government programs to save jobs and save lives.”

The new law maintains the policy that labor migration is a choice and should not be a necessity, but recognizes the urgent need at this time to employ a one-country-team approach to efficiently respond to the needs of OFWs and their families by elevating their concerns to a department level.

The new Department of Migrant Workers (DOMW) will rationalize government functions as to the overseas employment of Filipino Migrant Workers and ensure that their human and labor rights are always protected.

It seeks to pursue the 23-point objectives of the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM). It will address long-standing policy gaps on OFW recruitment, deployment, protection in the workplace, and reintegration.

It covers all Migrant Workers deployed and to be deployed, contract workers, seafarers and fishers on board, and excludes Filipinos living abroad. The new Department will have an AKSYON Fund to address the needs of Migrant Workers.  This will “provide legal, medical, financial, and other forms of assistance to Overseas Filipino Workers, including repatriation, shipment of remains, evacuation, rescue, and any other analogous help or intervention to protect the rights of Filipino nationals.”

Overseas Filipinos will continue to be serviced by the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) and will still be covered by the P1 billion ATN fund, and the P200-million legal assistance fund. In this way, no one will be excluded, Migrant Workers will be protected through the DOMW while Overseas Filipinos will still be assisted by the DFA.

The current Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) will become the backbone of the new Department to ensure that it can hit the ground running and will not have a long learning curve. This is crucial as our OFWs are constantly at risk both as to issues of trafficking and the violation of their labor rights in the receiving country, and as to their treatment and prioritization for vaccination and healthcare in the face of the pandemic.

The new Department will have a mandate beyond migration management, and will formulate plan, coordinate, promote, administer, and implement policies, and undertake systems for regulating, managing, and monitoring the overseas employment of Filipino workers and reintegration of OFWs, while taking into consideration the national development programs formulated by the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA).

The new Department will also “promote the empowerment and protection of Filipinos working overseas by empowering and training them to gain appropriate skills and by ensuring access to continuous training and knowledge development.

The new law also recognizes the principles of ethical recruitment that refers to the “lawful hiring of workers in a fair and transparent manner that respects and protects their dignity and human rights.”

“As principal sponsor of this bill, we have taken all precautions to ensure that no additional cost will be charged to our OFWs who already carry a huge financial burden – borrowing money and selling properties just to be able to work abroad to provide for their families,” said Mendoza.

The new Department will also mainstream Government initiatives to strengthen Reintegration Program for the sustainable return of OFWs into Philippine society, with livelihood projects, wellness programs, financial literacy programs and other similar projects based on the specific needs and skills of the returning OFWs.

“For far too long, our OFWs were hailed as our heroes but were often treated as second rate and second-class. OFWs were last in line for vaccination, not given greenlanes to facilitate their travel, and were faced with extreme difficulties in claiming their just compensation. They also had contracts which were replaced and substituted at will by employers and recruiters who milked them dry and sometimes killed them. Their passports and phones were confiscated, and they were treated as commodities. With this new Department, this is our national commitment to them and their families, that they are truly first-class citizens.”