Source: http://lawlibrary.chanrobles.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=30469:g-r-no-81144-may-7,-1990-meycauayan-college-v-franklin-m-drilon,-et-al&catid=1263&Itemid=566
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 00:44:57+00:00

Document:
MEYCAUAYAN COLLEGE, Petitioner, v. HONORABLE FRANKLIN M. DRILON, in his capacity as Secretary of the Department of Labor and Employment and MEYCAUAYAN COLLEGE FACULTY AND PERSONNEL ASSOCIATION (MCFPA), Respondents.
Froilan M. Bacungan & Associates for Petitioner.
Rodel Gil B. Villarico for Private Respondent.
The pivotal issue in this petition for certiorari is whether increases in employees’ salaries resulting from the implementation of presidential decrees and wage orders, which are over and above the agreed salary scale contracted for between the employer and the employees in a collective bargaining agreement, preclude the employees from claiming the difference between their old salaries and those provided for under said salary scale.
When the collective bargaining agreement was entered into, the following presidential decrees were in effect: (a) P.D. No. 1389 dated May 29, 1978 adjusting the existing statutory minimum wages; (b) P.D. No. 1713 dated August 18, 1980 providing for an increase in the minimum daily wage rates and for additional mandatory living allowances, and (c) P.D. No. 1751 dated May 14, 1980 increasing the statutory daily minimum wage at all levels by P4.00 after integrating the mandatory emergency living allowance under P.D. Nos. 525 and 1123 into the basic pay of all covered workers. Wage Order No. 2 increasing the mandatory basic minimum wage and living allowance was also issued on July 6, 1983 just before the collective bargaining agreement herein involved was entered into.
The union having struck and picketed the petitioner’s premises on May 20, 1987, the Secretary of Labor assumed jurisdiction over the labor dispute and, in his order of May 26, 1987, instructed Regional Office No. III to hear and receive the evidence of the parties and to submit a report thereon.
In his report, the Director of Regional Office No. III stated that the management had indeed complied with the salary and allowance increases ordained by law. However, he observed that the college’s compliance with said increases in salary and allowance were "not an ipso facto compliance with the collective bargaining agreement without violating the very aims and purpose of free collective bargaining for better terms and conditions of employment." According to the Director, the two should be distinguished from each other. Thus, while compliance with increases provided by law was mandatory, compliance with the provisions of a collective bargaining agreement was contractual and obligatory.
To illustrate his finding that the collective bargaining agreement had not been complied with by the college, the Director cited the example of a union member who had been with the college for twenty years. Under the standards law, she was entitled to a rate of P58.65 per period whereas under the collective bargaining agreement, she should receive P63.00 per period considering that the ranking system is observed therein.
Moreover, compliance with a collective bargaining agreement is mandated by the expressed policy to give protection to labor. 10 Unless otherwise provided by law, said policy should be given paramount consideration. Hence, inasmuch as the petitioner has failed to point to any provision of law or even of the collective bargaining agreement itself to the effect that benefits provided by the former encompass those provided by the latter, benefits derived from either the law of a contract should be treated as distinct and separate from each other.
What seems to be the life-force of petitioner’s case is its contention that an agreement on a salary scale should be distinguished from an agreement on a salary increase. Thus, it argues in fine that an agreement on a salary scale should be considered as an addition to the salary increase imposed by law and vice-versa. 11 This contention is fallacious.
"Offenses. — Offenses penalized under this Code and the rules and regulations issued pursuant thereto shall prescribe in three (3) years.
The one-year prescriptive period is inapplicable in this case because of peculiar factual circumstances which petitioner has not denied. Although the collective bargaining agreement covers school years 1983 to 1986, a copy of the agreement was only made available to the union in 1987. Immediately thereafter, the union sought its implementation. The union members might have been aware of the existence of the collective bargaining agreement but that fact that their president was actually a management employee being petitioner’s registrar, they must have been deterred from demanding its implementation earlier. Hence, to apply the provisions of Article 290 (Art. 291) would be unfair and prejudicial to the union members particularly those who have served petitioner for a number of years who stand to benefit most from the salary scale.
WHEREFORE, the decision of the Secretary of Labor is hereby AFFIRMED and the temporary restraining order of February 15, 1989 is LIFTED.
This decision is immediately executory. Costs against the petitioner.
2.	Rollo, pp. 8 & 38.
8.	Batangas Laguna Tayabas Bus Co. v. Court of Appeals, L-38482, June 18, 1976, 71 SCRA 470; Fegurin v. NLRC, G.R. No. 50483, February 28, 1983, 120 SCRA 910.
9.	MRR Yard Crew Union v. Philippine National Railways, L-33621, July 26, 1976, 72 SCRA 88; National Development Company v. NDC Employees and Worker’s Union, L-32387, August 19, 1975, 66 SCRA 181; Art. 250, Labor Code.
10.	Art. 3, Labor Code.
11.	Consolidated Reply, pp. 3-5; Rollo, pp. 91-93.
12.	See Marcopper Mining Corporation v. Ople, G.R. No. 51254, June 11, 1981, 105 SCRA 75.
13.	Philippine Apparel Workers Union v. NLRC, G.R. No. 50320, July 31, 1981, 106 SCRA 444, 456.
14.	Private respondent’s comment, p. 10, Rollo, p. 58.
15.	Petition, p. 18; Rollo, p. 22.

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