MANILA – Senate President Pro Tempore Ralph Recto on Tuesday urged Malacañang to send to Congress its own version of the bill containing the proposed salary standardization law (SSL) 5 that seeks to increase the salaries of government workers, including nurses and teachers.
“Mag-di-Disyembre na, ni anino ng Salary Standardization Law wala pa. Malamig na simoy ng hangin, wala pa rin ang panukala na nagtataas ng sahod ni titser ang ating naamoy (It’s nearly December, but even the shadow of the SSL 5 is nowhere in sight. The cold December air has arrived, but the bill raising teachers’ pay can’t be smelled in the air.) When will it come out of the Palace kitchen?,” Recto said.
“Our early Christmas wish is for the Palace to submit the bill soon so that Congress can debate on it, and bring it to the President’s table for his signature before Christmas Day,” Recto added.
Recto noted that the Duterte administration has promised to increase the salaries of civil servants through SSL 5.
He said the money for the increases, in the amount of PHP31.1 billion, has been pre-parked in the 2020 national budget.
“The money is there, the bill on its use will come later. And there is nothing wrong with putting the cart before the horse, as it assures government employees that a salary increase is a done deal,” he said.
The lawmaker, however, argued that the SSL 5 would require a separate law and therefore cannot be a “rider” in the General Appropriations Act.
He said it also cannot be implemented via executive order and can only be authorized by a congressional act.
“After the uniformed services had their salary increases two years ago, the government is duty-bound to extend the same to civilian government employees. It was a promise made to them, that after their uniformed counterparts have received theirs, the one for them will follow soon,” he said.
“It is time to redeem this promissory note. I can only surmise that the Palace is having a hard time calibrating the increases, and apportioning how much each one would get,” he added.
Recto said such move is not an “easy exercise to pull off”, as the government pay scale has 33 grades, with eight steps each, meaning 258 different pay grades must be attached with new amounts.
“The fact is, the pie, when cut, will result in not so big slices. PHP31.1 billion divided by 1.391 million civilian employees, and divided further by 13 months will result in an average PHP1,718 monthly increase per employee,” Recto added.