A group of teachers staged a demonstration outside the Philippine Senate on Monday, May 30, to call on Congress to pass a bill that will tax-exempt election service pay.
“We urge [legislators] to honor election frontliners, whose services were critical in their own election as lawmakers, by making sure that this legislation gets passed in the next few days, and immediately transmitted to the president for enactment,” said Raymond Basilio of the Alliance of Concerned Teachers.
Congress is set to deliberate on the proposed measure on third and final reading on Monday, the first day of the final week of the 18th Congress, which will close on June 3, 2022.
Last week, Senate Bill 2520 passed on second reading. If it gets approved on third and final reading, it will be reconciled with House Bill 9652 through a bicameral conference committee. The ratified version of the bill will then be up for the president’s signature.
The teachers earlier called on President Rodrigo Duterte to certify the bill as urgent to expedite its approval.
Basilio said that the recent imposition of much higher taxes — now at 20 percent, from just 5% in 2018 and 2019 — has “robbed poll workers Php900 to Php2,400 each.”
“Considering their meagre pay, which only range from Php4,500 to Php12,000 all in all, these taxes are indeed extremely burdensome and unjust,” said the teacher.
“Let them enjoy in full their modest but hard-earned compensation for honorably serving the country every election,” he added.
The teachers’ group has been calling for the inclusion of a provision in the bills that will refund all previous tax collections from election service pay.
The Senate heeded the call and added a specific provision in the pending bill for its application to begin in the May 9, 2022 polls, which means that the 20 percent tax deduction on honoraria and allowances shall be returned to poll workers once the law passes.
“We cannot emphasize enough how important this measure is to election frontliners and the urgency for it to be approved today and in the coming days,” said Basilio in a statement.
“If our legislators fail to do so, all our efforts will go to waste and our poll workers will continue to be deprived of their right to decent pay,” he said.
The teachers vowed to continue to monitor the progress of the legislation and press officials to immediately approve it.