Category Archives: Philippines

An example of on-the-job training

Ms. Catherine Abayao, Labor and Employment Officer, International Relations and Cooperation Division, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, describes her process of “on-the-job” training (December 2011).

Methods for on the job training

“I learned ILO based on reading materials about the ILO so I was able to know that the Philippines is a member of the ILO and as a member it has several obligations like we have to report on certain conventions that we have ratified and there is a period of reporting and also on ratified conventions and also submission of international labour standards that are being adopted by the Conference to the competent authorities.”

[Man’s voice in background] “That was very pretty!”

I came from the private sector before I entered here in the department. So I don’t have any background on the ILO, what it’s working on, how it is working, so through my own readings. When I’m given a task, I have to read what I am going to do, and then through my colleagues, they are also guiding us on how to make things. Our former chief here in the Division here in the Division has also undergone training on international labour standards and so she is the one who guides us on the ILO structure, its supervisory mechanism and so she emphasizes to us that if we are not going to submit our reports on time then we will be subjected to a certain ‘ILO-gram’, ILO reminding us of the submission of our reports. So, that is to supplement my reading.”

In 2010, Ms. Abayao was able to complement her on the job training with ITC/ILO training on ILS.

Special thanks got to the Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment of the Philippines, and the Director and staff of the International Labor Affairs Bureau of the Department of Labor of the Philippines for their generous cooperation in the production of this video.

Use employee performance commitments

Ms. Catherine Abayao, Labor and Employment Officer, International Relations and Cooperation Division, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, describes the use of employee performance commitments (December, 2011).

“Here in the Department also, we have an annual, how do you call this, employee performance commitment where we are being rated by our supervisors on how we are delivering our work or how are we performing, so like for example here in 2000 I’m holding a document from 2009 wherein I committed to… It is stated here that I commit to achieve the following targets: submission of compliance reports to the ILO so it mentions specifically here ratifying conventions, and ratified conventions ILO questionnaires if there are any ILO cases. So it’s included here in my commitment that I am going to perform these tasks. So failure to comply with these or failure to meet these targets, there would be a corresponding, huh, what do you call that, huh deduction on your performance rating. This maybe one of our motivation on improving our work.”

Special thanks go to the Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment of the Philippines, and the Director and staff of the International Labor Affairs Bureau of the Department of Labor of the Philippines for their generous cooperation in the production of this video.

International context gives importance to ILS

Ms. Celeste M. Valderrama, Director, International Labor Affairs Bureau, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, discusses the importance of ILS and ILS reporting for Philippines’ overseas workers (December, 2011).

“I might say that the fact that we have a lot of Filipinos working overseas emphasizes or puts emphasis to our mandate on overseas employment but not only in terms of programs that we are providing them but also the host country policy. So at the level of policy we are very much aware that it is through multilateral cooperation, bilateral cooperation that we can succeed in bringing about improvements in the conditions of our workers in bringing about more employment opportunities for them in the fields that they have chosen. In so many ways ILO is part of all this cooperation program, for most of which are the international labor standards. When a country, the host country has ratified this Convention, for example the migrant workers’ Convention, then we are sure that they will be, that they will care for our workers as much as we care for them. So they also of course provide a lot of technical support on our work concerning migrant workers and all the other international labour standards.”

A view of consultation from a supporting bureau

Ms. Maria Consuela Baki, Mediator/Arbiter, Bureau of Labor Relations, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, describes consultative processes from a perspective outside of that of the bureau directly responsible for preparing reports (December, 2011).

A view of consultations from a collaborating Bureau

“Hi, I am Maria Consula Baki, I am a Mediator/Arbiter of the Bureau of Labor Relations of DOLE. The Bureau of Labor Relations work with ILAB relative to contentions of the International Labour Organization, that’s why we were invited for this session.

We are the tripartite monitoring body of the Department of labor and with that we act as the secretariat for the National Tripartite Industrial Peace Council. We calendar consultations with both the employers’ sector and the workers’ sector. We try to meet with the sectors every month or as may be necessary because of circumstances that may arise, so if there is a report that is needed by the ILO, we try to conduct meetings with the sectors as much as necessary. As the secretariat for the National Tripartite Industrial Peace Council, we provide ILAB with reports that we collect from other government agencies as well. Everything pertaining to international labour affairs or anything pertaining to conventions of the ILO we coordinate with ILAB and then if there is a contention like for the domestic work or the maritime labour convention, the ILAB tries to invite us for possible consultations and then they forward us the convention and then we set that convention for consultation with the labour sector and the workers sector through the TIPC. We have a very close coordination because I think the Department of labor is not only concerned with labour matters locally but also we situate that we take care of the labour factor overseas, so we see the importance of coordinating with ILAB for us to be able to formulate policies that are both applicable both local and overseas, applicable to both local and overseas workers as well. The fact that we have a lot of overseas workers I think it is the general mandate of the department of labor to formulate policies that protect both its local and overseas workers so through coordinating with ILAB, we are able to foresee changes in the working conditions outside of the country and then we can actually address them from here.”

Special thanks to the the Honorable Secretary of Labor and Employment of the Philippines, and the Director and staff of the International Labor Affairs Bureau of the Department of Labor of the Philippines for their generous cooperation in the production of this video.

An example of the consultation process

Ms. Delia S. Palomar, Chief Labor and Employment Officer, International Relations and Cooperation Division, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, describes the consultation process followed in the Philippines (December, 2011).

The flow of consultation with government and with the social partners

“So for the past six years we have been doing quite well in our reporting obligations due to the fact that we subjected our reports to tripartite consultation, aside from the government consultation that we have upon the first draft. So after we do our first draft and consulted government organizations, we submit our report to the technical Executive committee of the tripartite industrial peace council for their inputs and their comments and as soon as we get their comments, we consolidate all of them into a draft Philippines report which is submitted to the ILO.

For ILS reporting, we… the consultation process takes upon receiving the request from the ILO, we coordinate with the concerned agencies, we write them a letter requesting for their inputs on the reports being requested by the ILO. As soon as we receive their inputs, we prepare them and transmit them, transmit to them (the agencies) through email for validation, after which we call them for a meeting, a consultation meeting to validate their responses. And also if other agencies have inputs to contribute on those reports.

In cases where we don’t have the answers we need, we try to research and we draft the replies and send it to the concerned officers for validation if we… huh if that is the correct reply and if they have more inputs to add. But sometimes that is one of the challenges that we are having in preparing the reports due to the various loads of other officers but as much as possible we try to submit to them the report for their proper answer.”

The value of institutionalized tripartite structure

Ms. Catherine Abayao, Labor and Employment Officer, International Relations and Cooperation Division, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines describes the benefit of established tripartite structures and high level support (December, 2011).

Institutionalized tripartite arrangements and high-level support

“Hi, I am Catherine Duladul and I work with Miss Delia and the International Labour Standards division and I have been with this division for seven years now. I want to share here the successes or the success that we have here in the department in producing our report to the ILO on time. First, because we have an established tripartite structure as explained by my colleagues a while ago. We have an institutionalized tripartite structure and an executive order. It is a policy making body where all our reports to the ILO are subjected to this tripartite body. And also one more thing here is that our official, the secretary herself is also very interested in ILO matters. She is knowledgeable in how ILO standards are being adapted and then when a certain country has ratified a certain convention. She knows the obligations that a ratifying State has too. So… in our case we had to work well and submit our reports on time because our heads are aware of our obligations.”

Working with challenges

Ms. Celeste M. Valderrama, Director, International Labor Affairs Bureau, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, discusses how challenges are worked with and overcome (December, 2011).

Can you speak of management challenges and motivations?

“Keeping my people who are skilled already in this area of concern is a major challenge, but we do appreciate the support of the ILO in this area because they provide us with training opportunities, but it’s quite limited, so even the number of people who are really trained to do the job is… We have to do it just one person at a time, right? … I don’t know, maybe it’s the commitment. Maybe they realize that the motivation is really knowing that there is no one else who can do this type of job. [laugh], and also knowing that we cannot afford to put a Government in an embarrassing position. The high level mission that came out after the finding has impressed on us more than ever the importance of paying details… of paying attention to the details of the report, so that we can ensure that , hmmmm… the evaluation by the Committee of Experts is based on a more complete, more comprehensive data. That is why our management, our leaders, put a lot of premium on this area of concern. But it’s not only the reportorial obligation, it’s not only commitment to the standards, compliance to the standards, it recognizes the value of international labour standards, because we have a lot of people everywhere overseas so we can’t do it just by ourselves. We should be able to do it together with the rest of the world.”

An example of arrangements for submission to the competent national authority

Ms. Delia S. Palomar, Chief Labor and Employment Officer, International Relations and Cooperation Division, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, describes how submission to the competent national authorities of newly adopted ILS is effectuated (December, 2011).

Arrangements for submission to the competent national authorities

“First submission to the competent authorities. As soon as we receive the document from the ILO requesting to the transmitted to National competent authorities we draft the memo or the letter to the Office of the Senate president and the Speaker of the House citing the importance of the convention and referring it to them for future legislation. So upon transmitting the text of the convention or the recommendation, we solicit the acknowledgement or whatever decisions the Senate or Congress will take into account for the said conventions. Like right now we just received the acknowledgement receipt from the House of Representatives acknowledging that they have received the text of the domestic work convention. In the case of the Domestic work Convention, we are in close coordination with the national competent authorities because we also consulted them for its certification and we indicated in our transmittal letter that the same is being referred to them because there is an action to ratify the convention. But in most cases we just notify them that there is a new convention or a new international instrument that should be taken into account in future legislation. In submitting the instrument to competent authorities, we indicate that it is in compliance with our obligation as a member State of the ILO and such instrument could be considered in their drafting of bills.”

Recognize value of a management system

Ms. Celeste M. Valderrama, Director, International Labor Affairs Bureau, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, discusses the importance of managing reporting processes (December, 2011).

“In this case, the management system is really important in doing this function. If you have an efficient system, if you have clear procedures and mandate and objectives [laugh] and it is clear to your people, you are able to get the information that you need. I think if you really think about it, monitoring work is a management function. The only difference is the appreciation of its value, what is the report for and if people in the management that can appreciate that, can understand that, then even the quantity and the quality of the reports will be able to meet that kind of requirement. My observation is that a person who has been involved, who has an extensive exposure is able to focus the report on what matters. I think our people can ably do their job because number one they are knowledgeable about the requirements, they are also aware of the implication if they don’t comply,[laugh] and then of course the Department has an appreciation that our commitment will not only be down to our productivity here in the Philippines but for people working overseas.”

Accessing legal expertise

Ms. Celeste M. Valderrama, Director, International Labor Affairs Bureau, Department of Labor and Employment, Philippines, describes how legal expertise is accessed on an “as-needed” basis (December, 2011).

“In previous years in the history of the ILAB, the office used to be ILAD, there were lawyers who were part of the personnel handling the division, the division handling the ILS. But they have left, they are gone now and we cannot anymore hire lawyers. So what do we do? With the limited resources, with the limited personnel that we have, we engage lawyers from all the other bureaus and so they provide a substantial… the substance to the report. We have lawyers from the Bureau of Labor relations, from the Bureau of Working Conditions, from the PRC for instance and the POEA. They are the ones handling the substantive reporting. I cannot really say do I need a lawyer, but a lawyer would be good, a lawyer would be helpful to do this ILS work here in this division, but if there is none, then we can accept the services of lawyers within the Department also, who provide the input to the report that we submit. I think the very controversial part of the report pertains to freedom of association and collective bargaining, I think for those areas we need a lawyer and then for that the Bureau of Labor relations provide that kind of inputs.”