Photo Release

Important piece of legislation: Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon lauds the passage of Senate Bill No. 2234 on third and final reading Tuesday, December 14, 2021. The bill seeks to create the Department of Migrant Workers and define its powers and functions. Drilon lauded Sen. Joel Villanueva, sponsor of the measure, for shepherding the passage of the proposed legislation, which Drilon said was an important piece of legislation and one of the major accomplishments of the Sotto presidency in the 18th Congress. “In my almost 24 years in the Senate, this is indeed one of the more difficult laws that we examined because of our desire to make sure that we do not uselessly spend public money for an expanded bureaucracy,” Drilon said. He said they conducted “a very extensive research” on the measure because they wanted to ensure that better services would be provided to overseas Filipino workers (OFWs). Drilon also thanked Villanueva for accepting several of his proposals which included strengthening the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) to protect the contributions of the OFWs by “considering it as a trust fund,” ensuring that a separate fund would be included to specifically respond to the needs of the OFWs and excluding Filipinos overseas since they would be under the jurisdiction of the Department of Foreign Affairs. (Screen grab/Senate PRIB)