Luzon Stevedoring Co., Inc. v Luzon Marine Department Union

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G.R. No. L-9265 April 29, 1957

LUZON STEVEDORING CO., INC., petitioner, vs.
LUZON MARINE DEPARTMENT UNION and THE HON. MODESTO CASTILLO, THE HON. JOSE S. BAUTISTA, THE HON. V. JIMENEZ YANSON and THE HON. JUAN L. LANTING, Judges of the Court of Industrial Relations, respondents.

Facts:

In June 1948, herein respondent Luzon Marine Department Union filed a petition with the Court of Industrial Relations containing several demands against herein petitioner Luzon Stevedoring Co., Inc. However, while the case was still pending with the CIR, said labor union declared a strike which was ruled down as illegal by this Court in 1950. In view of said ruling, the Union filed a "Constancia" with the Court of Industrial Relations praying that the remaining unresolved demands of the Union presented in their original petition, be granted. Said unresolved included:

a. Point No. 2. That the work performed in excess of eight (8) hours he paid an overtime pay of 50 per cent the regular rate of pay, and that work performed on Sundays and legal holidays be paid double the regular rate of pay.

The trial Judge rendered a decision in 1955, finding that the company gave said employees 3 free meals every day and about 20 minutes rest after each mealtime; that they worked from 6:00 am. to 6:00 p.m. every day including Sundays and holidays, and for work performed in excess of 8 hours, the officers, patrons and radio operators were given overtime pay in the amount of P4 each and P2 each for the rest of the crew up to March, 1947, and after said date, these payments were increased to P5 and P2.50, respectively, until the time of their separation or the strike of July 19, 1948; that when the tugboats underwent repairs, their personnel worked only 8 hours a day excluding Sundays and holidays; that although there was an effort on the part of claimants to show that some had worked beyond 6:00 p.m.

The evidence was uncertain and indefinite and that demand was, therefore, denied; that respondent Company, by the nature of its business and as defined by law is considered a public service operator by the Public Service Commission and, therefore, exempt from paying additional remuneration or compensation for work performed on Sundays and legal holidays, pursuant to the provisions of section 4 of Commonwealth Act No. 444.

Later on, a resolution modifying the decision of February 10, 1955, was issued, in the sense that the 4 hours of overtime work included in the regular daily schedule of work from 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. should be paid independently of the so-called "coffee-money", after making a finding that said extra amounts were given to crew members of some tugboats for work performed beyond 6:00 p.m. over a period of some 16 weeks. The Company's motion for reconsideration was denied.

From this resolution, the Luzon Stevedoring Co., Inc. filed the present petition for certiorari and when the Court of Industrial Relations, acting upon said Company's motion for clarification, ruled that the 20 minutes' rest given the claimants after mealtime should not be deducted from the 4 hours of overtime worked performed by said claimants, petitioner filed a supplemental petition for certiorari, and both petitions were given due course by this Court.


Issue:

W/N the definition for "hours of work" as presently applied to dryland laborers equally applicable to seamen?

Ruling:

NO.

Ratio:

Petitioner questions the applicability to seamen of the interpretation given to the phrase "hours of work" for the purpose of the Eight-Hour Labor Law, insinuating that although the seamen concerned stayed in petitioner's tugboats, or merely within its compound, for 12 hours, yet their work was not continuous but interrupted or broken. It has been the consistent stand of petitioner that while it is true that the workers herein were required to report for work at 6:00 a.m. and were made to stay up to 6:00 p.m., their work was not continuous and they could have left the premises of their working place were it not for the inherent physical impossibility peculiar to the nature of their duty which prevented them from leaving the tugboats.

It is the Company's defense that a literal interpretation of what constitutes non-working hours would result in absurdity if made to apply to seamen aboard vessels in bays and rivers, and We are called upon to make an interpretation of the law on "non-working hours" that may comprehend within its embrace not only the non-working hours of laborers employed in land jobs, but also of that particular group of seamen, i.e., those employed in vessels plying in rivers and bays, since admittedly there is no need for such ruling with respect to officers and crew of interisland vessels which have aboard 2 shifts of said men and strictly follow the 8-hour working period.
Section 1 of Commonwealth Act No. 444, known as the Eight-Hour Labor Law, provides:

SEC. 1. The legal working day for any person employed by another shall be of not more than eight hours daily. When the work is not continuous, the time during which the laborer is not working AND CAN LEAVE HIS WORKING PLACE and can rest completely, shall not be counted.

The requisites contained in this section are further implemented by contemporary regulations issued by administrative authorities (Sections 4 and 5 of Chapter III, Article 1, Code of Rules and Regulations to Implement the Minimum Wage Law).

For the purposes of this case, We do not need to set for seamen a criterion different from that applied to laborers on land, for under the provisions of the above quoted section, the only thing to be done is to determine the meaning and scope of the term "working place" used therein. As We understand this term, a laborer need not leave the premises of the factory, shop or boat in order that his period of rest shall not be counted, it being enough that he "cease to work", may rest completely and leave or may leave at his will the spot where he actually stays while working, to go somewhere else, whether within or outside the premises of said factory, shop or boat. If these requisites are complied with, the period of such rest shall not be counted.