WORKERS OUTSIDE OF METRO MANILA
SHOULD GET WAGE INCREASE TOO

Senate Minority Leader Aquilino Nene Q. Pimentel, Jr. (PDP-Laban) today asked labor and employment authorities to see it that workers in regions other than Metro Manila should get a reasonable increase in the daily minimum wage so that they can cope with the rising cost of living.

Pimentel lauded the Regional Wage Board in the National Capital Region for coming up with a decision to raise the workers wage in the premier region, although the amount of the increase, P25, leaves much to be desired.

The wage hike should not be limited to the workers in Metro Manila. All workers and their families throughout the country are suffering from high prices of food, transportation, medicine, milk, cooking oil, rents, electricity, water, of everything that life needs, he said.

Earlier, Pimentel called for the grant of a wage hike for workers even in regions where no formal petition for pay adjustment has been submitted by workers. He said the regional wage boards concerned can consider the grant of wage hike at their own initiative if warranted by prevailing economic and social conditions in the regions concerned and after due consultations with labor and management sectors.

The sooner pay hikes are given to the masses of our working people, the sooner they can alleviate the problems that confront them on a day-to-day basis, he said.