May employers legally ban employees who refuse to be vaccinated?

The Department of Labor and Employment has issued an advisory, DOLE ADVISORY 03-21, to address three questions. First, who shall pay for the vaccines? Second, can employees be compelled to be vaccinated? And third, can management refuse entry to workers who opt not to be vaccinated? The answers are all in favor of the workers and against the employers.

The DOLE Advisory, issued on March 12, 2021, was a triple whammy against the employers and will complicate the life of businessmen, making it difficult for the companies to manage their business during this pandemic. DOLE Secretary Bebot Belo is just doing his job to protect the workers. First, his advisory clarifies that the employers should pay for the vaccines and these are not cheap. Second, it prevents management from shifting the cost to the workers. Third, it prevents the employers from punishing those who refuse to be vaccinated and also prohibits management from refusing entry into company premises those who shun vaccination. The dilemma being faced by management now is how can management protect the rest of the workers who have obediently submitted to vaccination?

In times of difficulty, there should be mutual consultation, understanding, and sharing of pains among labor, management, and the government. DOLE is expected to consult the management sector and hear their views on the matter. DOLE officials are also expected to hear the side of the labor sector and do public hearings and consultations even via digital platform. Maybe, they have called one or two but the general public was not consulted. The HR community wasn’t asked to submit their position. The legal community was not heard either. We understand the pressures and we do appreciate the need for urgency. But consultations should be really done because lack of prior notice indicate lack of mutual respect. And that situation sabotages the outcome of the whole vaccination drive.

The initial stance of management was that: if we cannot compel employees to be vaccinated, then we should not be compelled to accept them into company premises because they will endanger those who opted to obeyed orders. Those who want to exercise their human rights not to get vaccinated should also respect the human rights of the employers to protect the health, safety, and welfare of those who did. Now, that the government has issued such an order, let me ask DOLE: What shall you do to employers who refuse to buy vaccines and refuse to vaccinate their workers? Will you punish them if their reason is that they cannot afford it? Do employers also have human rights?

There’s nothing wrong in protecting the workers. Protection to labor is a mandate in the Constitution. But protecting labor doesn’t mean that you should kill the businessmen’s right to survive. They are also human beings. They put up their hard-earned money, much of the capital is borrowed from the banks. To hit them with a triple bullet like this advisory would be, in effect, killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. Hundreds, if not thousands of companies have closed and millions of Filipinos have lost their jobs. If the government keeps on killing small businesses with too much taxes, corruption, inspections, and impositions like these, then the ultimate victims are the working class. We need balance and stability in policy, not just politics.

If there are many victims of summary executions, the very difficult policies issued by the government may also turn out to be some form of extrajudicial killings of small, medium-scale and micro enterprises. At the end of the day, the capitalist can transfer to Thailand, Vietnam, or Singapore. The workers will need to migrate then and compete for jobs at very high cost to them and their loved ones.