SENATOR Joel Villanueva has introduced amendments to fine tune the Senate Bill No. 2587, or the Enterprise Based Education and Training or EBET Framework Act.

The measure seeks to address job skills mismatch, unemployment and underemployment while ensuring a globally competitive, educated and highly skilled workforce adaptable to the demands and standards of the labor market.

Meanwhile, Senator Risa Hontiveros thanked Villanueva for accepting her amendments, particularly on her concerns regarding the financial constraints that trainees undergo when participating in enterprise-based education and training programs.

“This bill will now ensure that trainees under the general EBET program will be able to receive allowances from the enterprise to cover their transportation costs, meals and other expenses agreed upon between the trainee and enterprise,” Hontiveros said.

The senator said she was also pleased of the 20 percent limit on the number of trainees proportional to the number of employees in an enterprise, unless the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority would increase the percentage after a thorough assessment of its necessity.

She said the limit would prevent companies from misusing EBET to cut costs by having trainees instead of regular employees.