bills filed by bam aquino

Bam seeks to help graduates secure jobs through Trabaho Centers

A senator has filed a measure establishing Trabaho Centers in Senior High Schools all over the country, in a bid to bridge the gap between education and employment and address job mismatch.

 Sen. Bam Aquino’s Senate Bill No. 170 or the Trabaho Center in Schools Act will help Senior High School graduates under the K to 12 program, who chose to enter employment find opportunities through a job placement office.

 The measure will amend Section 9 of Republic Act No. 10533 or the Enhanced Basic Education Act of 2013 that implements the K to 12, to include Trabaho Centers under its scope.

 “While we work on equipping our graduates with the adequate skills to join the workforce, let us also bridge that gap between education and employment through the Trabaho Centers,” said Sen. Bam.

 According to Sen. Bam, the Trabaho Center will focus on three main things – career counseling services, employment facilitation and industry matching.

 “Career counseling services shall be offered to help guide the students on the tracks they choose in Senior High School while Employment Facilitation is envisioned to assist the needs of a job seeker or the senior high school student,” explained Sen. Bam.

 Through industry matching, the needs of companies will be addressed by providing them graduate listings and resume profiling of students.

 The Public Employment Services Office (PESO) and TESDA will join forces to create a thorough database of job opportunities in the locality and immediately coordinate further training that might be needed based on particular employment opportunities.

 “Through the Trabaho Centers, the needs of our nation’s graduates, businesses in the country, and the vision of the Department of Education come together to make the most of our curriculum reform and help us move closer to shared prosperity,” said Sen. Bam.

Bam wants businesses to give spare food to poor

A senator wants food-related businesses to donate their spare food to food-distribution charities or “food banks” to provide food security to our poorest Filipino families while also addressing food waste.

 “Sa taas ng presyo ng bilihin at presyo ng pagkain ngayon, hindi makatarungan na maraming nasasayang na pagkain,” said Sen. Bam Aquino as he filed Senate Bill No. 357 or the Zero Food Waste Act.

 In his measure, Sen. Bam wants to “ultimately end the cycle of having food end up in the trash instead of stomachs”.

 Sen. Bam submitted the measure days after the Social Weather Stations (SWS) released its 2016 first-quarter report, indicating that the number of families that experienced involuntary hunger rose to 3.1 million from 2.6 million in the last quarter of 2015.

 According to SWS, the total hunger rate accelerated to 13.7 percent during 2016’s first quarter from 2015’s fourth quarter of 11.7 percent.

 The measure seeks to create a National Anti-Food Waste Scheme, with the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) as coordinating agency between food businesses, such as food manufacturers, supermarkets, restaurants, cafeterias, and hotels, and food banks.

 The scheme will set guidelines and standards for the collection, storage, and distribution of edible food donated to food banks. It will also promote linkages between food banks and LGUs to create a community-based food distribution system for the food insecure.

 It will establish a Self-Sufficiency Program that provides the food insecure with skills training on managing food banks and livelihood programs to avoid dependence on donations.

 Food-related businesses will shoulder the costs of transporting edible food waste from business location to the food bank’s warehouse or distribution center and ensure its good condition upon arrival.

 If enacted into law, the penalty of prision correccional will be imposed on any individual, private or public, who deliberately makes food waste unfit for consumption.

 Sen. Bam said the same penalty is applicable to private or public actors who prevent the redirection of edible food waste to food banks or inedible food waste to waste management and recycling enterprises.

 In addition, Sen. Bam said the measure will push private individuals and their local governments to participate in a segregation campaign to have food waste readily available for recycling into fertilizer or compost.

Bam wants lower income tax, VAT exemption for small businesses

To further stimulate the growth of small businesses in the country, Sen. Bam Aquino is pushing for a measure that provides them with lower income tax rate, VAT exemption and other privileges.

Under Sen. Bam’s Senate Bill No. 169 or the Small Business Tax Reform Act, all small businesses shall be exempt from payment of income tax for the first three years of its operation from date of establishment and will be subjected to lower income tax rates thereafter.

 As defined in the bill, small businesses are micro and small enterprises whose annual gross revenue does not exceed P50,000,000.

“This bill also proposes the lowering of the income tax rate for MSEs and an exemption from VAT, among other methods of stimulating growth in MSEs as opposed to hindering it,” said Sen. Bam.

 The measure also pushes for simpler bookkeeping, a special lane and assistance desk for MSEs, exemption from tax audit, annual filing of returns, and payment in installment.

 Sen. Bam stressed the need for a simpler taxation, saying a joint study by PWC and the World Bank, Paying Taxes 2016, placed the Philippines 126th out of 189 economies in Ease of Paying Taxes.

 “This must change, which is why we are asserting the Small Business Tax Reform Act as a measure to simplify tax procedures and unburden our small businesses of the complex tax process,” said Sen. Bam.

 By streamlining the country’s tax system, it will boost the chances of our local enterprises to succeed and, in turn, generate prosperity and livelihood for more and more Filipino families.

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