Villanueva enjoins CSC to end contractualization in government

MANILA, Philippines — So many temporary employees are in government, and relatively few are given security of tenure that’s what Senate Majority Leader Joel Villanueva is urging the Civil Service Commission (CSC) to address.

Specifically, he wants the CSC to address the high number of job order (JO) and contract of service (COS) employees in government by providing them security of tenure, especially if they have civil service eligibility.

“It’s about time that we address the issue of contractualization in government,” said Villanueva.

Data cited by the senator showed that while there are 170,688 unfilled permanent positions in government, 642,077 employees are under JO or COS status and represent 26.07 percent of the entire government workforce.

“We have been raising the issue of unfilled positions in government during budget hearings since we became a senator in 2016; and the number of JOs and COS workers in government remains a problem,” he said.

CSC records show that the top government agencies with the biggest number of JO and COS employees are the Departments of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) at 22,457; of Education (DepEd) at 12,465; of Health (DOH), 8,188; of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), 7,340, and of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), 5,487.

The same data also showed that these agencies have the following unfilled positions: DPWH with 3,180; DepEd with 47,034; DOH with 21,038; DSWD with 381, and DENR with 2,430.

Villanueva acknowledged that despite the big number of unfilled positions in different government agencies, most JO and COS employees are not qualified to apply for them because they lack civil service eligibility.

As such, he has filed Senate Bill 568, which will institutionalize the Skills Certificate Equivalency Program and grant civil service eligibility to graduates of technical and vocational education and training courses who are holders of a National Certificate issued by the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA).

The senator, an advocate for workers’ rights, also filed Senate Bill 131, the proposed Civil Service Security of Tenure Act, which will provide permanent appointment and automatic civil service eligibility for all casual and contractual government employees who have rendered at least five years in service in the national government and six years in local government units and have at least a satisfactory rating for at least three years.

Villanueva, who formerly headed the TESDA, also lauded the move of the CSC to give “preferential rating” for JOs and COS in the next civil service examination which will put into consideration their number of years in service.

“This is a welcome development on the part of the CSC to secure jobs for JO and COS workers in the government. Let’s end ‘endo’ (a casual term for contractualization) in government once and for all,” he said.