Q: What is labor?

A: It is the exertion by human beings of physical or mental efforts, or both, towards the production of goods and services.

Q: What is labor law?

A: The law governing the rights and duties of the employer and employees with respect to: 1. The terms and conditions of employment and

2. Labor disputes arising from collective bargaining (CB) respecting such terms and conditions.

Q: What is the purpose of labor legislation?

A: Labor legislation is an exercise of police power.

The purpose of labor legislation is to regulate the relations between employers (Ers) and employees (Ees) respecting the terms and conditions of employment, either by providing for certain standards or for a legal framework within which better terms and conditions of work could be negotiated through CB. It is intended to correct the injustices inherent in Er Ee relationship. (2006 Bar Question)‐

Q: What are the classifications of labor law?

A: 1. Labor standards – The minimum terms and conditions of employment prescribed by existing laws, rules and regulations relating to wages, hours of work, cost of living allowance and other monetary and‐ ‐ welfare benefits. (Batong Buhay Gold Mines, Inc. v. Dela Serna, G.R. No. 86963, August 6,1999) e.g. 13th month pay

2. Labor relations – Defines and regulates the status, rights and duties, and the institutional mechanisms, that govern the individual and collective interactions of Ers, Ees, or their representatives. It is concerned with the stabilization of relations of Er and Ees and seek to forestall and adjust the differences between them by the encouragement of collective bargaining and the settlement of labor disputes through conciliation, mediation and arbitration. e.g. Additional allowance pursuant to Cba

3. Social legislation – It includes laws that provide particular kinds of protection or benefits to society or segments thereof in furtherance of social justice. e.g. GSIS Law, SSS Law, Philhealth benefits

Q: Is there any distinction between labor legislation and social legislation? Explain.

A: Labor legislation is sometimes distinguished from social legislation by the former referring to labor statutes, like Labor Relations Law and Labor Standards, and the latter to Social Security Laws. Labor legislation focuses on the rights of the worker in the workplace. Social legislation is a broad term and may include not only laws that give social security protection, but also those that help the worker secure housing and basic necessities. The Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law could also be considered a social legislation. All labor laws are social legislation, but not all social legislation is labor law. (1994 Bar Question)

Q: What are the sources of labor laws?

A: 1. Labor Code and other related special legislation

2. Contract

3. Collective Bargaining Agreement

4. Past practices

5. Company policies

A. FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES AND POLICIES 1.CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISIONS

Q: What are the constitutional mandates with regard labor laws?

A: 1. Sec. 3, Art. XIII – The State shall afford full protection to labor, local and overseas, organized and unorganized, and promote full employment and equality of employment opportunities for all. It shall guarantee the rights of all workers to self organization, collective bargaining and negotiations, and ‐peaceful concerted activities, including the right to strike in accordance with law. They shall be entitled to security of tenure, humane conditions of work, and a living wage. They shall also participate in policy and decision making processes affecting their rights and benefits as may be provided by law. The State ‐shall promote the principle of shared responsibility between workers and employers and the preferential use of voluntary modes in settling disputes, including conciliation, and shall enforce their mutual compliance therewith to foster industrial peace. The State shall regulate the relations between workers and employers, recognizing the right of labor to its just share in the fruits of production and the right of enterprises to reasonable returns to investments, and to expansion and growth.

2. Sec. 9, Art. II – The State shall promote a just and dynamic social order that will ensure the prosperity and independence of the nation and free the people from poverty through policies that provide adequate social services, promote full employment, a rising standard of living, and an improved quality of life for all.

3. Sec. 10, Art II ‐ The State shall promote social justice in all phases of national development.

4. Sec. 11, Art II ‐ The State values the dignity of every human person and guarantees full respect for human rights.

5. Sec. 13, Art. II ‐ The State recognizes the vital role of the youth in nation building and shall promote ‐and protect their physical, moral, spiritual, intellectual, and social well being. It shall inculcate in the ‐youth patriotism and nationalism, and encourage their involvement in public and civic affairs.

6. Sec. 14, Art. II ‐ The State recognizes the role of women in nation building, and shall ensure the ‐fundamental equality before the law of women and men.

7. Sec. 18, Art. II – The State affirms labor as a primary social economic force. It shall protect the rights of workers and promote their welfare.

8. Sec. 20, Art. II ‐ The State recognizes the indispensable role of the private sector, encourages private enterprise, and provides incentives to needed investments.

9. Sec. 1, Art. III ‐ No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law, nor shall any person be denied the equal protection of the laws.

10. Sec. 4, Art. III ‐ No law shall be passed abridging the freedom of speech, of expression, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and petition the government for redress of grievances.

11. Sec. 8, Art. III – The right of the people, including those employed in the public and private sectors, to form unions, associations, or societies for purposes not contrary to law shall not be abridged.

12. Sec. 1, Art. XIII ‐ The Congress shall give highest priority to the enactment of measures that protect and enhance the right of all the people to human dignity, reduce social, economic, and political inequalities, and remove cultural inequities by equitably diffusing wealth and political power for the common good. To this end, the State shall regulate the acquisition, ownership, use, and disposition of property and its increments.

13. Sec. 2, Art. XIII ‐ The promotion of social justice shall include the commitment to create economic opportunities based on freedom of initiative and self reliance.‐

14. Sec. 14, Art. XIII – The State shall protect working women by providing safe and healthful working conditions, taking into account their maternal functions, and such facilities and opportunities that will enhance their welfare and enable them to realize their full potential in the service of the nation.

Q: What is the State policy on labor as found in the constitution (Sec. 3, Art. XIII)?

A: 1. Afford full protection to labor

2. Promote full employment

3. Ensure equal work opportunities regardless of sex, race, or creed FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES AND POLICIES

4. Assure the rights of workers to self organization, security of tenure, just and humane conditions of work, participate in policy and decision making processes affecting their right and benefits‐

5. Regulate the relations between workers and employers

Q: What are the basic rights of workers guaranteed by the Constitution (Sec. 3, Art. XIII)?

A: 1. Security of tenure

2. Receive a living wage

3. Humane working conditions

4. Share in the fruits of production

5. Organize themselves

6. Conduct collective bargaining or negotiation with management

7. Engage in peaceful concerted activities including strike

8. Participate in policy and decision making processes

Q: What is the principle of non oppression?‐

A: The principle mandates capital and labor not to act oppressively against each other or impair the interest and convenience of the public. The protection to labor clause in the Constitution is not designed to oppress or destroy capital. (Capili v. NLRC, G.R. No. 117378, Mar. 26, 1997)

Q: What are other related laws to labor?

A: 1. Civil Code

a. Art. 1700 – The relations between capital and labor are not merely contractual. They are so impressed with public interest that labor contracts must yield to the common good. Therefore, such contracts are subject to the special laws on labor unions, collective bargaining, strikes and lockouts, closed shop, wages, working conditions, hours of labor and similar subjects.

b. Art. 1701 – Neither capital nor labor shall act oppressively against the other, or impair the interest or convenience of the public.

c. Art. 1702 – In case of doubt, all labor legislation and all labor contracts shall be construed in favor of the safety and decent living for the laborer.

d. Art. 1703 – No contract which practically amounts to involuntary servitude, under any guise whatsoever, shall be valid.

2. Revised Penal Code

Art. 289 – Formation, maintenance and prohibition of combination of capital or labor through violence or threats. – Any person who, for the purpose of organizing, maintaining or preventing coalitions or capital or labor, strike of laborers or lock out of employees, shall employ violence or threats in such a ‐degree as to compel or force the laborers or employers in the free and legal exercise of their industry or work, if the act shall not constitute a more serious offense in accordance with the provisions of the RPC. 3. Special Laws

a. GSIS Law

b. 13th Month Pay Law

c. Retirement Pay Law

d. SSS Law

e. Paternity Leave Act

f. Anti – Child Labor Act

g. Anti – Sexual Harassment Act

h. Magna Carta for Public Health Workers

i. Solo Parents Welfare Act of 2000

j. National Health Insurance Act as amended by R.A. 9241

k. Migrant Workers and Overseas Filipinos Act of 1995 as amended by RA 10022

l. PERA Act of 2008

m. Home Development Mutual Fund Law of 2009

n. The Magna Carta of Women

o. Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law as amended by R.A. 9700

3.LABOR CODE

Q: What is the aim of labor laws?

A: The justification of labor laws is social justice. Social justice is “neither communism, nor despotism, nor atomism, nor anarchy,” but the humanization of laws and the equalization of social and economic force by the State so that justice in its rational and objectively secular conception may at least be approximated. Social justice means the promotion of the welfare of all the people, theadoption by the government of measures calculated to insure economic stability of all the competent elements of society, through the maintenance of a proper economic and social equilibrium in the interrelations of the members of the community, constitutionally, through the adoption of measures legally justifiable, or extra constitutionally, through the exercise of powers underlying the existence of all governments on ‐the time honored principle of salus populi est suprema lex. (Calalang v. Williams, G.R. No. 47800, Dec. 2,‐ 1940)

Q: What is “compassionate justice”?

A: It is disregarding rigid rules and giving due weight to all equities of the case. e.g: Employee validly dismissed may still be given severance pay.

Q: How should doubts in the implementation and interpretation of the Labor Code (LC) and its Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR) be resolved?

A: They should be resolved in favor of labor.

Q: What is the concept of liberal approach in interpreting the LC and its IRR?

A: The workers' welfare should be the paramount consideration in interpreting the LC and its IRR. This is rooted in the constitutional mandate to afford full protection to labor. (PLDT v. NLRC, G.R. No. 111933, July 23, 1997). It underscores the policy of social justice to accommodate the interests of the working class on the humane justification that those who have less in life shall have more in law. (PAL v. Santos, G.R. No. 77875, Feb. 4, 1993). (2006 Bar Question)

Q: Art. 4 of the LC provides that in case of doubt in the implementation and interpretation of the provisions of the LC and its IRR, the doubt shall be resolved in favor of labor. Art. 1702 of the Civil Code also provides that in case of doubt, all labor legislation and all labor contracts shall be construed in favor of the safety and decent living of the laborer. Mica Mara Company assails the validity of ‐these statutes on the ground that they violate its constitutional right to equal protection of the laws. Is the contention of Mica Mara Company tenable? Discuss fully

A: No, the Constitution provides that the State shall afford full protection to labor. Furthermore, the State affirms labor as a primary economic force. It shall protect the rights of workers and promote their welfare. (1998 Bar Question)

a.Art. 3. Declaration of Basic Policy

Q: What is the policy of the State as regards labor as found in the Labor Code (Art. 12)?

A: 1. Promote and maintain a State of full employment through improved manpower training, allocation and utilization; 2. Protect every citizen desiring to work locally or overseas by securing for him the best possible terms and conditions of employment; 3. Facilitate a free choice of available employment by persons seeking work in conformity with the national interest; 4. Facilitate and regulate the movement of workers in conformity with the national interest; 5. Regulate the employment of aliens, including the establishment of a registration and/or work permit system; 6. Strengthen the network of public employment offices and rationalize the participation of the private sector in the recruitment and placement of workers, locally and overseas, to serve national development objectives; 7. Ensure careful selection of Filipino workers for overseas employment in order to protect the good name of the Philippines abroad.

Q: What are the reasons for affording greater protection to employees?

A: 1. Greater supply than demand for labor; and 2. Need for employment by labor comes from vital and desperate necessity. (Sanchez v. Harry Lyons Construction Inc., G.R. L 2779, Oct. 18, 1950)‐

Q: Are all labor disputes resolved in favor of labor?

A: No. The law also recognizes that management has rights which are also entitled to respect and enforcement in the interest of fair play. (St. Lukes Medical Center Ees Ass’n v. NLRC, G.R. No. 162053, Mar. 7, 2007)

Art. 5. Rules and Regulations

Q: Who is given the “rule making power”?‐

A: The Department of Labor and other gov’t agencies charged with the administration and enforcement of the Labor Code or any of its parts shall promulgate the necessary implementing rules and regulations. Such rules and regulations shall become effective 15 days after announcement of their adoption in newspapers of general circulation.

Q: What are the limitations to the “rule making power” given to the Secretary of Labor and ‐Employment and other gov’t agencies?

A: It must:

1. Be issued under the authority of the law

2. Not be contrary to law and the Constitution

Art. 6. Applicability

Q: To whom shall all rights and benefits under the LC apply?

A: GR: All rights and benefits granted to workers under the LC shall apply alike to all workers, whether agricultural or non agricultural. XPN:‐

1. Government employees (Ees)

2. Ees of government corporations created by special or original charter

3. Foreign governments

4. International agencies

5. Corporate officers/ intra corporate disputes which fall under P.D. 902 A and now fall under the ‐ ‐jurisdiction of the regular courts pursuant to the Securities Regulation Code (SRC).

6. Local water district except where NLRC’s jurisdiction is invoked.

7. As may otherwise be provided by the LC