ACT Teachers partylist  Rep. France Castro has sought a higher budget for social amelioration programs of the Department of Labor and Employment like ‘Tulong Panghanapbuhay sa Ating Disadvantaged and Displaced Workers and Covid19 Adjustment Measures Program’ so that these could also cover private school teachers affected by the pandemic.

During the budget deliberations at the House of Representatives, Castro said she  received numerous reports of private school teachers being retrenched because of school closures and low enrollment rate.

The lawmaker lamented that private school teachers receive little to none from the fund assistance program of  the government.

“Having inadequate budget allocation for these social amelioration programs would only mean that many private school teachers will still not be able to avail of these aid from the government,” Castro said.

She earlier asked DOLE to submit a list of private schools that closed because of the pandemic and a list of private school teachers who were given amelioration.

“There’s an overwhelming number of complaints from private school teachers on how they were excluded from financial assistance of the government since the various generalized lockdowns were imposed,” Castro said.

“Many private school teachers already do not receive any monthly compensation from their schools. Many schools who applied for the amelioration measures of DOLE were also deemed unfit to receive financial assistance based on the qualifications of DOLE or were rejected due to exhaustion of their initial funds. We fear that with the small budget for social amelioration for private workers, private school teachers will again be excluded from the augmentation measures of DOLE,” she added.