Solons urge Duterte to include teachers' pay hike in 2019 budget

Representatives of the ACT Teachers party-list has urged President Rodrigo Duterte to include in the proposed 2019 national budget the funds for the pay hike for public school teachers and all rank-and-file civilian government employees.

The lawmakers made the call after President Rodrigo Duterte himself on Friday assured public school teachers that he would raise their pay during his term.

"The President even knows how teachers resort to incurring loans just to make ends meet," ACT Teachers party-list Representative Antonio Tinio said in a statement on Sunday.

"It's high time to go beyond promises and to actually walk the talk by issuing marching orders to Department of Budget and Management (DBM) Secretary Benjamin Diokno to include funds for government pay hike in the administration's proposal for the 2019 budget," he added.

In a speech in Davao City, Duterte vowed to increase the salary of public school teachers, but said it cannot be doubled as they would have wanted since there are not much resources for it.

"Ang inyo, kayo ang isunod ko pero hindi naman masyado doblado. Hindi talaga kaya. I'm not blaming anybody but simply there are too many Filipinos. Ang resources natin wala," he said.

ACT Teachers party-list Representative France Castro said a substantial pay hike is what toiling state workers have been waiting for so long.

"While we are not  stubborn in asserting immediate doubling of salaries as the president initially promised, we cannot accept a meager increase like Aquino's Executive Order (EO) 201," she said.

"We demand the immediate implementation of a P30,000 entry-level salary for public school teachers and P16,000 as the minimum salary for employees in the government service," she added.

Tinio, however, expressed worry that since the President admitted that the country is controlled by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, Duterte may be inclined to grant an insignificant pay hike like that in EO 201.

"These international financial institutions are responsible for neoliberal impositions on budget policies of past and current administrations such as the dependence on legislation of the salary increases for government employees as well as the limitation and even disallowance of their benefits," he said.

"The president must disown these oppressive impositions of global financial institutions. To effectively serve the Filipino people, he only needs to listen to our  hardworking government employees and heed their clamor for salaries that will enable them to cope with unrelenting price hikes," he added.

Castro said Duterte should have a clear amount and timeline as to when the pay hike for public school teachers and employees will be given, and this timeline "should not start later than the 2019 budget deliberations."

"As workers in the private sector were not fooled by his recently issued bogus anti-endo Executive Order 51, teachers and rank-and-file government employees will no longer be pacified by his empty rhetorics. Instead of promises and sweet talk, Filipino workers need immediate and substantial pay hike," she said.

ACT Teachers party-list representatives have earlier filed House Bill 7211 which seeks to grant P30,000 salary for a Teacher I position, P31,000 salary for Instructor I, and a P5,000 Personnel Economic Relief Allowance for all government employees.

"We demand President Duterte and the DBM to include the funds for the substantial salary increase of public school teachers and rank-and-file government employees in the 2019 budget," they said.

"We enjoin our colleagues in both houses of Congress to champion the cause of our state workers and ensure that this pay hike be realized," they added. —ALG, GMA News