Labor Principles
Labor Principles
Labor Principles
JOSE
M. CAPACITE, RESPONDENT.
G.R. No. 199780, September 24, 2014
BRION, J.:
While item 17, Annex "A" of the Amended Rules of Employee's Compensation
considers lung cancer to be a compensable occupational disease, it likewise provides
that the employee should be employed as a vinyl chloride worker or a plastic worker. In
this case, however, Elma did not work in an environment involving the manufacture of
chlorine or plastic, for her lung cancer to be considered an occupational disease.
[13]
There was, therefore, no basis for the CA to simply categorize her illness as an
occupational disease without first establishing the nature of Elma's work. Both the law
and the implementing rules clearly state that the given alternative conditions must be
satisfied for a disease to be compensable.
The illness was caused by employment and the risk of contracting the disease is
increased by the working conditions. To say that since the proof is not available,
therefore, the trust fund has the obligation to pay is contrary to the legal requirement that proof
must be adduced. The existence of otherwise non-existent proof cannot be presumed. The
Court has recognized the validity of the present law and has granted and rejected claims
according to its provisions. We find in it no infringement of the worker's constitutional
rights
Government Guarantee
YNARES-SANTIAGO, J.:
Section 1 (b), Rule III of the Rules Implementing PD No. 626, as amended, states
that for the sickness and the resulting disability or death to be compensable, the same
must be the result of an occupational disease listed under Annex "A" with the conditions
set therein satisfied; otherwise, proof must be shown that the risk of contracting the
disease is increased by the working conditions.
Diabetes mellitus, is a non-occupational disease, hence not compensable. Jaime
A. Valenciano’s hypertension is held to be directly connected to his primary ailment,
diabetes mellitus, and therefore non-compensable.
The degree of proof required under P.D. No. 626 is merely substantial evidence,
which means, "such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to
support a conclusion." What the law requires is a reasonable work-connection and not a
direct causal relation. It is enough that the hypothesis on which the workmen's claim is
based is probable. Medical opinion to the contrary can be disregarded especially where
there is some basis in the facts for inferring a work-connection. Probability, not
certainty, is the touchstone. While claimant must adduce substantial evidence that the
risk of contracting the illness is increased by the working conditions to which an
employee is exposed to, we cannot close our eyes to any reasonable work-related
connection of the worker’s ailment and his employment.
Any doubt on this matter has to be interpreted in favor of the employee,
considering that P.D. No. 626 is a social legislation.
MENDOZA, J.:
Under Section 8(c) of R.A. No. 8282, an employer is defined as "any person,
natural or juridical, domestic or foreign, who carries on in the Philippines any trade,
business, industry, undertaking, or activity of any kind and uses the services of another
person who is under his orders as regards the employment, except the Government and
any of its political subdivisions, branches or instrumentalities, including corporations
owned or controlled by the Government." Ambassador Hotel, as a juridical entity, is still
bound by the provisions of R.A. No. 8282. Section 22 (a) thereof states:
Remittance of Contributions, (a) The contributions imposed in the preceding section
shall be remitted to the SSS within the first ten (10) days of each calendar month
following the month for which they are applicable or within such time as the
Commission may prescribe. Every employer required to deduct and to remit such
contributions shall be liable for their payment and if any contribution is not paid to the
SSS as herein prescribed, he shall pay besides the contribution a penalty thereon of
three percent (3%) per month from the date the contribution falls due until paid. If
deemed expedient and advisable by the Commission, the collection and remittance of
contributions shall be made quarterly or semi-annually in advance, the contributions
payable by the employees to be advanced by their respective employers: Provided, that
upon separation of an employee, any contribution so paid in advance but not due shall
be credited or refunded to his employer.
PERLAS-BERNABE, J.:
Deeply ingrained in our jurisprudence is the principle that a decision that has
acquired finality becomes immutable and unalterable. As such, it may no longer be
modified in any respect even if the modification is meant to correct erroneous
conclusions of fact or law and whether it will be made by the court that rendered it or by
the highest court of the land.
The only exceptions to the general rule are the correction of clerical errors, the
so-called nunc pro tunc entries which cause no prejudice to any party, void judgments,
and whenever circumstances transpire after the finality of the decision which render its
execution unjust and inequitable.
This principle finds its context on the postulate that a corporation is an artificial
being invested with a personality separate and distinct from those of the stockholders
and from other corporations to which it may be connected or related.
Under the doctrine of "piercing the veil of corporate fiction," the court looks at
the corporation as a mere collection of individuals or an aggregation of persons
undertaking business as a group, disregarding the separate juridical personality of the
corporation unifying the group. Another formulation of this doctrine is that when two
business enterprises are owned, conducted and controlled by the same parties, both law
and equity will, when necessary to protect the rights of third parties, disregard the legal
fiction that two corporations are distinct entities and treat them as identical or as one
and the same.
GARCIA, J.:
Health Assessment
Evidence must be presented to show a history of any trauma to the head at work.
There was never any evidence of this. There was never any mention of any head trauma
that the deceased suffered. There being no evidence of trauma, the connection to the
brain hemorrhage cannot be established. As to his hypertension, the ECC found that he
did not have any history and that it caused impairment of the function of body organs
like kidneys, heart, eyes and brain. None of the medical reports had established the
same. Evidently, the death of Emilio cannot be concluded as compensable.
Health Assessment