Maternity Children’s Hospital vs Secretary of Labor

GR No. 78909; June 30, 1989

Facts:
Petitioner is a semi-governmental hospital in Cagayan De Oro and Employing
forty-one
(41) employees. Aside from salary and living allowances, the employees are given food,
but the amount of which is deducted from their respective salaries. On May 3, 1986, ten
(10) employees filed a complaint with the Regional Director of Labor and Employment,
Region 10, for underpayment of their salaries and ECOLAS. Consequently, the
Regional Director directed two of his labor standard and welfare officers to investigate
and ascertain the truth of the allegations in the complaint.

Based on the report and recommendation, the Regional Director issued an order
dated August 4, 1986, directing payment of ₱ 723, 888.58, to all the petitioner’s
employees. The Secretary of Labor likewise affirmed the Decision and dismissed the
Motion for Reconsideration of the petitioner.

In a petition for certiorari, petitioner questioned the jurisdiction of the Regional

Director and the all-embracing applicability of the award involving salary differentials
and ECOLAS, in that it covers not only the hospitals employees who signed the
complaints, but also those who are not signatories to the complaint, and those who
were no longer in the service of the hospital at the time the complaint was filed.

Issues:
1. Whether or not the Regional Director had jurisdiction over the case; and
2. Whether or not the Regional Director erred in extending the award to all hospital
employees

Held:
1. The answer is in the affirmative the Regional Directors has a jurisdiction in this
labor standard case. This is Labor Standard case, and is governed by Article 128
(b) of the Labor Code , as amended by E.O. No. 111.

“Labor standards refer to the minimum requirements prescribed by

existing laws, rules, and regulations relating to wages, hours of work,
cost of living allowance and other monetary and welfare benefits,
including occupational, safety, and health standards (Section 7, Rule I,
Rules on the Disposition of Labor Standards Cases in the Regional
Office, dated September 16, 1987)”.
 Under the present rules, a Regional Director exercises both visitorial and enforcement
power over labor standards cases, and is therefore empowered to adjudicate money claims,
provided there still exists an employer-employee relationship, and the findings of the regional
office is not contested by the employer concerned. We believed…that even in the absence of
E. O. No. 111, Regional Directors already had enforcement powers over money claims,
effective under P.D. No. 850, issued on December 16, 1975, which transferred labor
standards cases from the arbitration system to the enforcement system.

2. The Regional Director correctly applied the award with respect to those employees who
signed the complaint, as well as those who did not sign the complaint, but were still
connected with the hospital at the time the complaint was filed. The justification for the award
to this group of employees who were not signatories to the complaint is that the visitorial and
enforcement powers given to the Secretary of Labor is relevant to, and exercisable over
establishments, not over individual members/employees, because what is sought to be
achieved by its exercise is the observance of, and/ or compliance by such firm/establishment
with the labor standards regulations. However, there is no legal justification for the award in
favor of those employees who were no longer connected with the hospital t the time the
complaint was filed. Article 129 of the Labor Code in aid of the enforcement power of the
Regional Director is not applicable where the employee seeking to be paid is separated from
service. His claim is purely money claim that has to be subject of arbitration proceedings and
therefore within the original and exclusive jurisdiction of the Labor Arbiter.
Maximo Calalang vs A.D. Williams
GR No. 47800; 2 December 1940

Facts:
Maximo Calalang in his capacity as a private citizen and a taxpayer of Manila filed a petition for a writ of
prohibition against the respondents.
It is alleged in the petition that the National Traffic Commission, in its resolution of July 17, 1940,
resolved to recommend to the Director of the Public Works and to the Secretary of Public Works and
Communications that animal-drawn vehicles be prohibited from passing along Rosario Street extending from
Plaza Calderon de la Barca to Dasmariñas Street from 7:30 Am to 12:30 pm and from 1:30 pm to 530 pm; and
along Rizal Avenue extending from the railroad crossing at Antipolo Street to Echague Street from 7 am to
11pm for a period of one year from the date of the opening of the Colgante Bridge to traffic.
The Chairman of the National Traffic Commission on July 18, 1940 recommended to the Director of
Public Works with the approval of the Secretary of Public Works the adoption of the measure proposed in the
resolution aforementioned in pursuance of the provisions of the Commonwealth Act No. 548 which authorizes
said Director with the approval from the Secretary of the Public Works and Communication to promulgate rules
and regulations to regulate and control the use of and traffic on national roads.
On August 2, 1940, the Director recommended to the Secretary the approval of the recommendations
made by the Chairman of the National Traffic Commission with modifications. The Secretary of Public Works
approved the recommendations on August 10, 1940.
The Mayor of Manila and the Acting Chief of Police of Manila have enforced and caused to be enforced
the rules and regulation. As a consequence, all animal-drawn vehicles are not allowed to pass and pick up
passengers in the places above mentioned to the detriment not only of their owners but of the riding public as
well.

Issue:
1. Whether the rules and regulations promulgated by the respondents pursuant to the provisions of
Commonwealth Act NO. 548 constitute an unlawful inference with legitimate business or trade
and abridged the right to personal liberty and freedom of locomotion

2. Whether the rules and regulations complained of infringe upon the constitutional precept
regarding the promotion of social justice to insure the well-being and economic security of all the
people

Held:
1. No. The promulgation of the Act aims to promote safe transit upon and avoid obstructions on
national roads in the interest and convenience of the public. In enacting said law, the National
Assembly was prompted by considerations of public convenience and welfare. It was inspired
by the desire to relieve congestion of traffic, which is a menace to the public safety. Public
welfare lies at the bottom of the promulgation of the said law and the state in order to promote
the general welfare may interfere with personal liberty, with property, and with business and
occupations. Persons and property may be subject to all kinds of restraints and burdens in order
to secure the general comfort, health, and prosperity of the State. To this fundamental aims of
the government, the rights of the individual are subordinated. Liberty is a blessing which should
not be made to prevail over authority because society will fall into anarchy. Neither should
authority be made to prevail over liberty because then the individual will fall into slavery. The
paradox lies in the fact that the apparent curtailment of liberty is precisely the very means of
insuring its preserving.

2. No. Social justice means the promotion of the welfare of all the people, the adoption by the
Government of measures calculated to insure economic stability of all the competent elements
of society, through the maintenance of a proper economic and social equilibrium in the
interrelations of the members of the community, constitutionally, through the adoption of
measures legally justifiable, or extra-constitutionally, through the exercise of powers underlying
the existence of all governments on the time-honored principles of salus populi est suprema lex.

Social justice must be founded on the recognition of the necessity of interdependence among
divers and diverse units of a society and of the protection that should be equally and evenly
extended to all groups as a combined force in our social and economic life, consistent with the
fundamental and paramount objective of the state of promoting health, comfort and quiet of all
persons, and of bringing about “the greatest good to the greatest number.”

THE PETITION IS DENIED WITH COSTS AGAINST THE PETITIONER.

PLDT vs National Labor Relations Commission and Marilyn Abucay
GR No. 80609; 23 August 1988

Facts:
Marilyn Abucay, a traffic operator of the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company, was accused
by two complainants of having demanded and received from them the total amount of P3,800.00 in
consideration of her promise to facilitate approval of their applications for telephone installation.
Investigated and heard, she was found guilty as charged and accordingly separated from the service.
She went to the Ministry of Labor and Employment claiming she had been illegally removed. Despite
of her being dismissed for cause, (as contended by PLDT) the labor arbiter (from NLRC) in his
decision ruled that the complainant (herein private respondent) must be given one month pay for
every year of service as financial assistance. The labor arbiter finds the same as equitable, taking into
consideration her long years of service to the company whereby she had undoubtedly contributed to
the success of the company.
NOTE: Marilyn Abucay had served in the company for 10 years.
Thus, she must be awarded 10 months separation pay for every year of her service.

Issue:
1. W/N the award of separation pay for the private respondent is just.

Held:
NO. The rule embodied in the Labor Code is that a person dismissed for cause as defined
therein is not entitled to separation pay. The separation pay, when it was considered warranted, was
required regardless of the nature or degree of the ground proved, be it mere inefficiency or something
graver like immorality or dishonesty. Separation pay shall be allowed as a measure of social justice
only in those instances where the employee is validly dismissed for causes other than serious
misconduct or those reflecting on his moral character. Where the reason for the valid dismissal is, for
example, habitual intoxication or an offense involving moral turpitude, like theft or illicit sexual
relations with a fellow worker, the employer may not be required to give the dismissed employee
separation pay, or financial assistance, or whatever other name it is called, on the ground of social
justice. If the employee who steals from the company is granted separation pay even as he is validly
dismissed, it is not unlikely that he will commit a similar offense in his next employment because he
thinks he can expect a like leniency if he is again found out. This kind of misplaced compassion is not
going to do labor in general any good as it will encourage the infiltration of its ranks by those who do
not deserve the protection and concern of the Constitution. Those who invoke social justice may do
so only if their hands are clean and their motives blameless and not simply because they happen to
be poor.
We hold that the grant of separation pay in the case at bar is unjustified. The private
respondent has been dismissed for dishonesty, as found by the labor arbiter and affirmed by the
NLRC and as she herself has impliedly admitted. The fact that she has worked with the PLDT for
more than a decade, if it is to be considered at all, should be taken against her as it reflects a
regrettable lack of loyalty that she should have strengthened instead of betraying during all of her 10
years of service with the company. If regarded as a justification for moderating the penalty of
dismissal, it will actually become a prize for disloyalty, perverting the meaning of social justice and
undermining the efforts of labor to cleanse its ranks of all undesirables.
SSS vs CA
GR No. 85279; 28 July 1989

Facts:
The petitioners went on strike after the SSS failed to act upon the union’s demands concerning the
implementation of their CBA. SSS filed before the court action for damages with prayer for writ of
preliminary injunction against petitioners for staging an illegal strike. The court issued a temporary
restraining order pending the resolution of the application for preliminary injunction while petitioners
filed a motion to dismiss alleging the court’s lack of jurisdiction over the subject matter. Petitioners
contend that the court made reversible error in taking cognizance on the subject matter since the
jurisdiction lies on the DOLE or the National Labor Relations Commission as the case involves a
labor dispute. The SSS contends on one hand that the petitioners are covered by the Civil Service
laws, rules and regulation thus have no right to strike. They are not covered by the NLRC or DOLE
therefore the court may enjoin the petitioners from striking.

Issue:
1. Whether or not SSS employers have the right to strike
2. Whether or not the CA erred in taking jurisdiction over the subject matter.

Held:
The Constitutional provisions enshrined on Human Rights and Social Justice provides
guarantee among workers with the right to organize and conduct peaceful concerted activities such
as strikes. On one hand, Section 14 of E.O No. 180 provides that “the Civil Service law and rules
governing concerted activities and strikes in the government service shall be observed,
subject to any legislation that may be enacted by Congress” referring to Memorandum Circular No. 6,
s. 1987 of the Civil Service Commission which states that “prior to the enactment by Congress of
applicable laws concerning strike by government employees enjoins under pain of administrative
sanctions, all government officers and employees from staging strikes, demonstrations, mass
leaves, walk-outs and other forms of mass action which will result in temporary stoppage or disruption
of public service.” Therefore in the absence of any legislation allowing govt. employees to strike they
are prohibited from doing so.

In Sec. 1 of E.O. No. 180 the employees in the civil service are denominated as
“government employees” and that the SSS is one such government-controlled corporation with an
original charter, having been created under R.A. No. 1161, its employees are part of the civil service
and are covered by the Civil Service Commission’s memorandum prohibiting strikes.

Neither the DOLE nor the NLRC has jurisdiction over the subject matter but instead it is the
Public Sector Labor-Management Council which is not granted by law authority to issue writ of
injunction in labor disputes within its jurisdiction thus the resort of SSS before the general court for the
issuance of a writ of injunction to enjoin the strike is appropriate.
ECOP vs National Wages and Productivity Commission
GR No. 96169; 24 September 1991

Facts:

On October 15, 1990, the Regional Board of the National Capital Region issued Wage Order No.
NCR-01, increasing the minimum wage by P17.00 daily in the National Capital Region. The Trade
Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP) moved for reconsideration; so did the Personnel
Management Association of the Philippines (PMAP). ECOP opposed.

On October 23, 1990, the Board issued Wage Order No. NCR01-A, amending Wage Order No. NCR-
01. It provides that all workers and employees in the private sector in the National Capital Region
already receiving wages above the statutory minimum wage rates up to one hundred and twenty-five
pesos (P125.00) per day shall also receive an increase of seventeen pesos (P17.00) per day.

ECOP appealed to the National Wages and Productivity Commission contending that the board's
grant of an "across-the-board" wage increase to workers already being paid more than existing
minimum wage rates (up to P125.00 a day) as an alleged excess of authority. ECOP further alleges
that under the Republic Act No. 6727, the boards may only prescribe "minimum wages," not
determine "salary ceilings." ECOP likewise claims that Republic Act No. 6727 is meant to promote
collective bargaining as the primary mode of settling wages, and in its opinion, the boards can not
preempt collective bargaining agreements by establishing ceilings.

On November 6, 1990, the Commission promulgated an Order, dismissing the appeal for lack of
merit. On November 14, 1990, the Commission denied reconsideration. ECOP then, elevated the
case via petition for review on certiorari to the Supreme Court.

Issue:

The main issue in this case is whether Wage Order No. NCR-01-A providing for new wage rates, as
well as authorizing various Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Boards to prescribe minimum
wage rates for all workers in the various regions, and for a National Wages and Productivity
Commission to review, among other functions, wage levels determined by the boards is valid.

Ruling:

The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the National Wages and Productivity Commission and Regional
Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board-NCR, Trade Union Congress of the Philippines and denied
the petition of ECOP.

The Supreme Court held that Republic Act No. 6727 was intended to rationalize wages, first, by
providing for full-time boards to police wages round-the-clock, and second, by giving the boards
enough powers to achieve this objective. The Court is of the opinion that Congress meant the boards
to be creative in resolving the annual question of wages without labor and management knocking on
the legislature's door at every turn.
.
The Court's opinion is that if Republic No. 6727 intended the boards alone to set floor wages, the Act
would have no need for a board but an accountant to keep track of the latest consumer price index, or
better, would have Congress done it as the need arises, as the legislature, prior to the Act, has done
so for years. The fact of the matter is that the Act sought a "thinking" group of men and women bound
by statutory standards. The Court is not convinced that the Regional Board of the National Capital
Region, in decreeing an across-the-board hike, performed an unlawful act of legislation. It is true that
wage-firing, like rate-fixing, constitutes an act Congress; it is also true, however, that Congress may
delegate the power to fix rates provided that, as in all delegations cases, Congress leaves sufficient
standards. As this Court has indicated, it is impressed that the above-quoted standards are sufficient,
and in the light of the floor-wage method's failure, the Court believes that the Commission correctly
upheld the Regional Board of the National Capital Region.
Colgate Palmolive Philippines vs Hon. Blas F. Ople, Colgate Palmolive Sales Union

Facts:
On March 1, 1985, the respondent Union filed a Notice of Strike with the Bureau of Labor Relations
(BLR) on ground of unfair labor practice consisting of alleged refusal to bargain, dismissal of union
officers/members; and coercing employees to retract their membership with the union and restraining non-
union members from joining the union.
After efforts at amicable settlement proved unavailing, the Office of the Minister of Labor Employment
(MOLE), upon petition of petitioner, assumed jurisdiction over the dispute. In its position paper, petitioner
pointed out among others that: (a) there is no legal basis for the charge that the company refused to bargain
collectively with the union considering that the alleged union is not the certified agent of the company
salesmen.
The respondent reiterated the issue in its Notice to Strike, alleging that it was duly registered with a
total membership of 87 regular salesmen (nationwide) out of 117 regular salesmen presently employed by the
company, leaving no doubt that the true sentiment of the salesmen was to form and organize Colgate -
Palmolive Salesmen Union. The respondent further alleged that the company is unreasonably delaying the
recognition of the union and which the company took an adversarial stance by secretly distributing a “survey
sheet on union membership” to newly hired salesmen purposely avoiding regular salesmen who are now
members of the union; that with a handful of the survey sheets secured by management through coercion, it
now would like to claim that all salesmen are not in favor of the organization of the union, which acts are clear
manifestations of unfair labor practices.
Respondent Minister rendered a decision which he found no merit in the Union’s Complaint for unfair
labor practice and found that the three salesmen “not without fault” and that “the company has grounds to
dismiss abovementioned salesmen” and at the same time, Respondent Minister directly certified the
Respondent Union as the collective bargaining agent, and ordered the reinstatement of the three salesmen.

Issue/s:
1. W/N Respondent Minister committed a grave abuse of discretion when he directly certified the Union
solely on the basis of the latter’s self-serving assertion that it enjoys the support of the majority of the
sales force in petitioner’s company
2. W/N Respondent Minister committed grave abuse of discretion when, notwithstanding his very own
finding that there was just cause for the dismissal of the three salesmen, he nevertheless ordered their
reinstatement

Held:
1. Petitioner concedes that respondent Minister has the power to decide labor dispute in a case
assumed by him under Art. 264 (g) of the Labor Code but this power was exceeded when he certified
respondent Union as the exclusive bargaining agent of the company’s salesmen since this is not a
representation proceeding as described under the Labor Code. Moreover, the Union did not pray for
certification, but merely finding of unfair labor practice imputed to petitioner - company.
Minister merely relied on the self - serving assertion of the respondent Union that it enjoyed the
support of the majority of the salesmen, without subjecting such assertion to the test of competing
claims.
2. The order of the respondent Minister to reinstate the employees despite a clear finding of guilt on their
part is not in conformity with law. Reinstatement is simply incompatible with a finding of guilt. Where
the totality of the evidence was sufficient to warrant the dismissal of the employees the law warrants
their dismissal without making any distinction between a first offender and a habitual delinquent.
Under the law, respondent Minister is duly mandated to equally protect and respect not only the labor
or workers' side but also the management and/or employers' side. The law, in protecting the rights of
the laborer, authorizes neither oppression nor self-destruction of the employer. To order the
reinstatement of the erring employees namely, Mejia, Sayson and Reynante would in effect
encourage unequal protection of the laws as a managerial employee of petitioner company involved in
the same incident was already dismissed and was not ordered to be reinstated.
As stated by Us in the case of San Miguel Brewery vs. National Labor Union, 2 "an employer cannot
legally be compelled to continue with the employment of a person who admittedly was guilty of
misfeasance or malfeasance towards his employer, and whose continuance in the service of the latter
is patently inimical to his interest."

Disposition:
WHEREFORE, judgment is hereby rendered REVERSING and SETTING ASIDE the Order of the respondent
Minister, dated December 27, 1985 for grave abuse of discretion. However, in view of the fact that the
dismissed employees are first offenders, petitioner is hereby ordered to give them separation pay. The
temporary restraining order is hereby made permanent.