House OKs bill protecting rights of kasambahay

The House of Representatives approved on Wednesday night House Bill (HB) 6144, establishing standards of protection for the 1.9 million domestic workers (kasambahay) in the country.   Passed on third and final reading, the Kasambahay bill requires employers to provide three basic necessities—board, lodging and medical assistance—to their household help, nursemaids, cooks, gardeners and laundry persons.   The bill, which is one of President Benigno Aquino III’s priority measures, also seeks to ensure that domestic workers have access to outside communication and basic education. It likewise guarantees that the privacy of these workers is respected, as well as their right to a rest period of eight hours per day.   Under HB 6144, employers are also required to enter into a contract with domestic workers, and to register the name of domestic workers in the barangay. Employers are further required to pay wages of domestic workers in cash, and to provide pay slips to their household help.   The proposed legislation also enumerates the following acts against domestic workers as unlawful: -    requiring domestic workers to make deposits, where deductions will be made in case they lose or destroy household materials, -    debt bondage or requiring a person to render service to a household for an unspecified amount of time as a form of debt payment, -    hiring minors as household help, -    assigning domestic workers to non-household work, -    interfering with a worker’s freedom to dispose his or her wages as they wish, -    withholding the wages of a domestic worker.   Employers who violate these restrictions will be slapped with a fine of P10,000 to P40,000, and will have appropriate civil or criminal cases filed against them.   San Juan Rep. Joseph Victor Ejercito, one of the bill’s authors, described the passage of the Kasambahay bill as historic.   “After 15 years in the making, [the House] has finally enacted a bill that is for the benefit of our 1.9 million kasambahays. I am so pleased by this development. This will be one of the major legacies the 15th Congress will leave behind,” the lawmaker said in a statement.   The Senate version of the bill is still pending at the committee level. Once approved by the Senate, a bicameral conference committee will convene to reconcile the Senate’s and the House’s versions. Once the bicameral committee approves the bill, it will be returned to the House and Senate for ratification. It will then be submitted to Malacañang for the signature of the President. — DVM, GMA News