Senator Joel Villanueva on Thursday, Sept. 23 said it cannot be denied that the COVID-19 pandemic has changed the dynamics in the country’s employment system and, thus, the government and the private sector should now intensify their vaccination program.
Speaking at the 2021 Congress of the Public Employment Service Office (PESO), an employment service facility established in all Local Government Units (LGUs) in coordination with the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), Villanueva emphasized the need for the vaccination of all workers, either by their employers or the government.
“We should focus not only on jobs, but also on jabs. But first, we should face our problems and deal with them squarely,” Villanueva said at the forum.
The Senate Committee on Labor and Employment chairman also noted that getting vaccinated against COVID-19 now seems to be an additional pre-employment requirement.
“It’s not really a requirement but COVID vaccine is slowly becoming an employment issue,” Villanueva said.
He further said the pandemic and lockdowns continue to kill jobs, “but there are signs of hope” as there are vaccination programs can potentially bring back jobs and workers in a more massive scale.
The government, he said, can take the cue from San Miguel Corp. (SMC), one of the country’s biggest companies and employers which offered a vaccination program for its 70,000 workers.
Another is the vaccination rollout for seafarers conducted by the Magsaysay Maritime Corp. At least 2,000 Filipino seafarers received vaccine jabs last June 17.
“There are seafarers who already boarded ships even without vaccines. Some of them are lucky because their ships or manning agencies have vaccination programs especially for Filipino seafarers working in cruise ships,” Villanueva said.
“But many still need to be vaccinated before they can board ships. Most of the time, it’s to each his own for them in lining up at LGUs,” he pointed out.
A free vaccination against COVID-19 can also be incorporated into the First-Time Jobseekers Assistance Act, which he sponsored and authored. The law mandates that people applying for jobs for the first time should not be made to pay for pre-employment documents.
“If pre-employment documents serve as stumbling block to get immediate employment and we waived the fees to provide assistance to first-time jobseekers, PESO should also take an active role in assisting first-time jobseekers to ensure that jabs reach their arms if COVID vaccine jabs get in the way of our people getting dignified jobs,” Villanueva said.