The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) should be in charge of distributing the special risk allowances (SRA) of health workers if the Department of Health (DOH) cannot do the job, Senate Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri said.
Zubiri made the proposal as he noted the contrasting statements of DOH officials and health workers during the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee's inquiry Wednesday, August 18, on the delayed release of the SRA and other benefits for health frontliners.
While the DOH said it has released the SRA, health workers and hospitals maintained they have yet to receive any from the government.
"Kung hindi nila kaya, baka mas maganda na ibigay na lang sa Department of Labor 'yong para sa nurses (If they cannot do it, maybe it's better to just give to the DOLE the allocation for the nurses)?" Zubiri said in an interview with ONE News after the hearing.
In floating the idea, Zubiri said the DOLE have already distributed its financial aid for workers displaced by the pandemic. He said he has raised his proposition to Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III.
"There must be a fault in the system. Baka hindi na nila kaya? Baka 'di na nila kayang i-download sa lahat ng private hospitals (Maybe the DOH cannot do it? Maybe they cannot download it all private hospitals)," he said, lamenting that money was "wasted".
Zubiri said senators would consider their findings from hearing in discussing the DOH's appropriation in the 2022 national budget.
He surmised that Congress would still include the SRA in next year's budget, noting the pandemic would not go away anytime soon.
In their presentation to the Senate panel, the DOH officials said they have obligated nearly P15 billion in SRAs and other benefits for health care workers under the Bayanihan to Recover as One Act, or Bayanihan 2.
But when senators pointed out that obligations do not equate to actual disbursements, one DOH official admitted that some P2.7 billion has yet to be distributed to health workers.
Like his colleagues, Zubiri said it is "not fair" for Health Secretary Francisco Duque III to say that he is losing sleep because of the Commission on Audit's (COA) recent report, mentioning health workers who have been working in the frontlines since the pandemic started.
"Especially those who have yet to receive their SRA," Zubiri said in Filipino.