The Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP) has said the proposed Department of Filipino Overseas and Foreign Employment (DFO-FE) could put the already vulnerable sector of household service workers at even more risk because it doesn’t count them in.
In a press briefing, TUCP president Raymond Mendoza said the bill has a five-year timeline to deploy only skilled and semi-skilled Filipino workers.
“There are many reports that this particular sector is heavily exploited abroad,” Mendoza said.
Mendoza added that the provision aims to limit deployment of OFWs.
Private sector representative in the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) Governing Board Estelita S. Hizon said that the provision may lead to more OFW abuses.
Hizon insists that the bulk of OFWs are household workers.
POEA data showed that out of 459,080 deployed new hires in 2017, half or 251,349 are HSWs.
“You will not be able to stop these workers from going abroad as long as they have hungry stomachs in their homes they have to feed, and children who need to be sent to school,” Hizon told BusinessMirror.
“They will use whatever means to work abroad even if it is illegal,” she added.
The current bill remains pending before the Legislature despite having been certified as urgent by President Rodrigo Duterte.
