Posts tagged with House Bill

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April 15, 2011

Congress hearing on the legislated ban on “No Permit No Exam” policies

House of Representatives Committee Hearing on House Bill 807

Last March 23, 2011, Wednesday, the House of Representatives’ Committee on Higher and Technical Education tackled Kabataan Party-List’s House Bill 807 or the “Anti ‘No Permit No Exam Policy’ Bill.” It is a bill that would prohibit the implementation of the unjust “No Permit No Exam” policy being imposed in many schools, colleges and universities nationwide.

I’ve always believed that such a policy is unjust because it essentially forces the threat of academic delinquency on a student because of the financial capacity of his family. There are other means schools can explore in order to ensure payments of tuition and other fees without imposing prejudice on the academic standing of a student.

(Imagine a scenario where an honor student is dropped from the honor roll simply because his parent’s remittance was delayed due to a natural calamity in the country where the parent works, or a war breaks out there.) We actually received dozens of emails and calls a day last month because of the complaints about the “no permit, no exam” policy.

House of Representatives Committee Hearing on House Bill 807

Majority of the congressmen in attendance favorably affirmed the bill in principle and agreed to have the bill consolidated into a final version with the other bills with a similar purpose. The consolidated version is to be approved on the next hearing. Only the congressman from A Teacher Party-List (which is a misnomer because they obviously represent the private interests of school owners and businessmen) rejected the bill and tried to water it down with so many nonsense insertions. As of the moment there are around thirty (30) congressmen who have signed House Bill 807 as co-authors.

On another note, we were able to successfully get the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) to speak about the issue, and in a joint press conference, CHED reiterated their Memo (CMO No. 02-2010) instructing schools through an appeal not to implement the “no permit no exam” policy. It also brought to everyone’s attention Sec. 99 of the Manual for Regulation of Higher Education Institutions which states that “no higher education institution shall deny final examinations to a student who has outstanding financial or property obligations, including unpaid tuition and other school fees corresponding to the school term.”

House of Representatives Committee Hearing on House Bill 807

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October 6, 2010

Call Center Agents Unite!

Call center agents and BPO workers unite! Support House Bill 2592!

A few days ago, a call center agent visited us at the Congress office to express her despair over the working conditions in her place of work. She’s now been dismissed (for being a “trouble maker”), and is currently fighting for her separation benefits in court. She reveals how she’s also been afflicted with carpal tunnel syndrome which her company refuses to compensate as a work-related problem. She claims she is not the only one suffering the same. Many of her co-workers have apparently also gotten pneumonia, two of whom had died. Many of them also have urinary tract infection (UTI).

She is not the first one to approach us narrating their problems working with BPO companies. It has become apparent that many BPO (business process outsourcing) companies commit various forms of exploitation in order to rake in the profits from this “sunshine industry”. From refusing to grant regularization to workers having had worked for more than six months (through various schemes), to refusing to provide adequate health and occupational safety services in such a sickness-prone environment (one of the surprisingly very common grievance is the no-bathroom break policy), many (I would assume that not all) companies (as in any industry) employ various means to maintain their profit margins at the expense of their employees.

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January 15, 2010

The Danger with the Cybercrime Prevention Act

In a press release by the House of Representatives leadership, Speaker Prospero Nograles revealed that the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2009 (H.B. 6974) is up for third reading approval, meaning there would be no more deliberations nor debates over the bill and all Congress needs to do is to grant it its vote of approval. In other words, it’s as good as having been passed in the House.

Although we recognize the need for legislation that will protect individuals and institutions from malicious attacks through electronic means, it must not be addressed by a law that sweeps broadly to cover a myriad of electronic devices and many other legitimate electronic activities exercised by ordinary citizens. H.B. 6974 unfortunately, does not provide clear-cut definitions to “electronic devices” nor to “cybercrimes”. By deliberately providing a vague and catch-all definition of such devices and activities, government institutions and agents mandated to execute the Cybercrime Prevention Act, in case it is implemented, are dangerously empowered to intrude into the privacy of individuals, interfere with ordinary and harmless electronic activities and suppress legitimate forms of expression through electronic means.

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September 10, 2009

Free Special Education Act of 2009

This is the second bill we filed since Kabataan took its rightful seat in the House of Representatives. It’s a comprehensive measure that seeks to guarantee free and appropriate basic education to all Filipino children and youths with special needs, granted the severe shortage of public special education (SPED) facilities in the country and the lack of support from the government.

Based on the principle that children and youth with special needs have the right to participate and contribute to society, this bill seeks to ensure the equality of special children’s access to social services and self-improvement opportunities, their full participation in decisions concerning their welfare, and the possibility of their economic self-sufficiency.

Below is a brochure I prepared for the bill. Click here for the full text of the bill, H.B. 6771.

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September 9, 2009

An Act Amending the Public Libraries Establishment Act of 1993

This is one of the first two bills which we filed in Congress since Kabataan was granted its seat a few months ago. It’s a bill which aims to strengthen and modernize existing public libraries in the country and to step up the efforts of establishing public libraries in all cities and municipalities in the Philippines, as well as reading centers in all barangays. Read the text of the bill, H.B. 6770, here. Below are jpeg copies of the brochure I prepared about the bill, click on the images for the larger version.

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