House Bill No. 195 pushes for P15-K across-the-board salary increase for teachers.
Public school teachers can have a P15,000 salary increase should House Bill No. 195 be approved in the House of Representatives.
The bill is the Congress’ response to the teachers’ appeal for an increase on their wages and benefits. The salary increase will be regardless of their position and employment status, and will be based on Department of Education’s existing policies on merit selection and promotion.
The said measure is set to cover an across-the-board salary increase and benefits for teachers in all elementary, secondary, and tertiary public schools including that of technical and vocational schools. The bill aims to attract highly qualified teachers to work in government schools.
“The responsibility of molding a child to become a productive Filipino citizen lies heavily in the hands of a teacher. This is the delicate duty that teachers have committed in their line of work being intimately connected with building the nation’s future. Despite this, however, existing laws are still unresponsive to their plight of enduring a measly salary as compensation for their work,” said Deputy House Speaker Romero “Miro” Quimbo co-authored the bill.
Included in the bill, the teachers hired for the first time will be given a one-year tax exemption, and teachers who have been in the profession for 15 years will be given pension fund.
Quimbo added that even the Republic Act No. 4670 or the Magna Carta for Public School Teachers being enacted, the social and economic status of teachers and their living and working conditions have either stayed the same or have worsened.
The 16th Congress administered by Former President Benigno Aquino III failed to pass the Salary Standardization Law (IV) which was supposed to benefit 1.6 million government workers, including teachers.
President Rodrigo Duterte, for his part, earlier announced that he will increase the salary of teachers after implementing an incremental increase for the military.