The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) was able to settle thousands of cases involving monetary and collective bargaining awards totaling 3,443,384,000 pesos and benefiting 53,058 workers in 2022.
In a year-ender, DOLE, through its National Conciliation and Mediation Board (NCMB) reported that its case management mechanism disposed of 19,802 cases with 2.353 billion pesos monetary award to 28,466 workers.
For DOLE’s SEnA or Single Entry Approach, 14,960 workers received a total of 618 million pesos monetary award.
SEnA is an administrative mechanism that provides speedy, impartial, inexpensive, and accessible settlement procedures for all labor issues or conflicts to prevent them from ripening into full-blown disputes or actual labor cases.
With a 99 percent settlement rate, DOLE’s Preventive Mediation mechanism meanwhile awarded 227 million pesos to 5,672 workers
For settled notice of strike/lockouts, 3,938 workers received a monetary award of 245 million pesos.
DOLE also recorded a 100 percent settlement rate of actual strike/lockout during the year in review, benefitting 22 workers with 384 thousand pesos.
DOLE’s conciliation and mediation mechanism is non-litigious/non-adversarial, less expensive, and expeditious labor dispute resolution. Under this informal set-up, the parties find it more beneficial to fully ventilate their respective positions without running around with legal technicalities.
DOLE reminds that any party to a labor dispute, either the union or management, may seek the assistance of NCMB or any of its Regional Branches by means of a formal request for conciliation and preventive mediation. Depending on the nature of the problem, a request may be filed in the form of consultation, notice of preventive mediation, or notice of strike/lockout.
Meanwhile, 332,037 workers, employees, as well as students have benefited from the Labor and Employment Education Service or LEES.
LEES aims to increase awareness of workers’ and employers’ rights and responsibilities, work ethics, values, and skills.
Moreover, 1,726 union members graduated from the Workers Organization Development Program of DOLE’s Bureau of Labor Relations.
The labor department has also operationalized 104 Grievance Machinery to promote dialogue between labor and management and maintain industrial peace.
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