Philippine Bar review · Question

Practice question: Backwages

Multiple Choice Hard

Practice question

An employer relies on old cases involving probationary teaching personnel to argue that every illegally dismissed probationary employee, including a factory worker governed by the ordinary Labor Code framework, can recover only to the probation period’s end. What is the central error under C.P. Reyes?
  1. Teaching and factory work are always governed by identical special regulations.
  2. Probationary workers never have security of tenure.
  3. Backwages are available only to public teachers.
  4. The argument generalizes special academic-employment rulings and ignores the main decision’s rule for illegally dismissed non-academic probationary employees.
  5. The Court abolished probationary employment.

Legal references

  • Labor Code, DOLE consolidated 2022 edition, Articles 219, 258–260, 262–264, 274 and 278–279: https://natlex.ilo.org/dyn/natlex2/natlex2/files/download/15242/PHL15242%202022.pdf; Article 294.
  • C.P. Reyes Hospital v Barbosa, G.R. No. 228357, April 16, 2024, en banc main decision, probationary backwages and academic-employment qualification: https://lawphil.net/judjuris/juri2024/apr2024/gr_228357_2024.html
  • Bustamante v NLRC, G.R. No. 111651, November 28, 1996, en banc resolution, full backwages without deduction of earnings elsewhere: https://lawphil.net/judjuris/juri1996/nov1996/gr_111651_1996.html
  • Angono Medics Hospital v Agabin, G.R. No. 202542, December 9, 2020, separation pay and backwages: https://lawphil.net/judjuris/juri2020/dec2020/gr_202542_2020.html

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