ASSOCIATED WATCHMEN AND SECURITY UNION (PTWO) PETITIONER, VS. THE HON. JUDGES JUAN LANTING, ARSENIO MARTINEZ, EMILIANO TABIGNE, OF THE COURT OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND MACONDRA…

The Republic Ships Security Agency is one of three agencies employed
by certain shipping agencies in the City of Manila and respondent
Macondray and Company, Inc., in guarding ships or vessels arriving at
the port of Manila and discharging cargo on its piers. The other
watchmen and security agencies are the K. Tagle Ship Watchmen Agency
and the City Watchmen and Security Agency. Thirty-eight affiliates of
the Republic Ships Security Agency belong to the petitioner labor union.

On or about February 18, 1956, petitioner union and its members
declared a strike against 19 shipping firms in the City of Manila. The
strike was certified by the President of the Philippines to the Court
of Industrial Relations and the latter court immediately took
cognizance of the strike. Attempts were made by the Court of Industrial
Relations to settle the strike. At the hearing or conference before the
court on March 16, 1956, the strikers, through counsel, expressed their
desire to return back to work and maintain the status quo.
Attorney for the respondents offered to see the shipping companies
concerned and to ask them to try to have the 47 watchmen, who claim to
have been discharged, to be reemployed. The strikers agreed to this
proposal and on April 6, 1956, a petition was filed before the Court of
Industrial Relations asking for reinstatement of 47 strikers who belong
to the petitioner Associated Watchmen and Security Union (PTWO). The
manager of respondent Macondray and Company, Inc. expressed willingness
to employ the strikers belonging to the petitioner union under the
condition that the agency to which they belong file a bond in the sum
of P5,000 in favor of Macondray and Company, Inc. to respond for any
negligence, misfeasance or malfeasance of any of the watchmen of
petitioner (Exhibit “1”, respondent). This requirement of filing a bond
was also demanded of the other two security agencies, the K. Tagle Ship
Watchmen Agency and the City Watchmen and Security Agency. However, the
Republic Ships Security Agency, to which most of the members of the
petitioner union belonged, failed to comply with the demands of
Macondray and Company, Inc. that they furnish such a bond. The manager
of the agency was one by the name of Fernando Derupe. Because of the
failure of the Republic Ships Security Agency to furnish a bond,
Macondray and Company, Inc. refused to employ watchmen from the said
agency. Some of the members of the agency transferred to the other two
agencies that had furnished a bond and after having joined the said
agencies they were employed as watchmen by the respondent Macondray and
Company, Inc.

On November 15, 1956, Macondray and Company, Inc, was charged with
unfair labor practice for having dismissed and refused to employ 38
members of the petitioner herein. Macondray and Company, Inc. answered
the complaint alleging that the members of the petitioner union are not
its employees, but employees of the Republic Ships Security Agency;
that the respondent had not demanded a bond from the members of the
petitioner union but from the Republic Ships Security Agency; that it
has not discriminated against members of the petitioner union.

The judge of the Court of Industrial Relations who tried the case
was Judge Jose S. Bautista. The said judge made the following findings
of fact:

“1. On February 18, 1956 there were three (3)
watchmen agencies servicing the respondent company with watchmen,
namely, the City Watchmen and Security Agency, K. Tagle Ship Watchmen
Agency and Republic Ship Security Agency.

“Of these three (3)
agencies, only the members of the complainant union working under the
Republic Ship Security Agency, struck and abandoned vessels of the
respondent’ company. (Testimony of Gunner pp. 49-63, Hearing of
November 2, 1957.)

“After the said strike of the complaining
union on February 18, 1956, a bond of P5,000 was required by the
respondent company. No bond was required by the company before the
strike. Whereas, K. Tagle Ship Watchmen and the City Watchmen and
Security Agency, which did not strike and abandon vessels of the
company, filed the required bond, the striking union Associated
Watchmen and Security Union refused to file said bond. Consequently,
the company stopped giving vessels to Republic Ship Security Agency;
hence the watchmen working under said agency were refused reinstatement.

“2.
It is an admitted fact that the said 38 individuals arc members of the
complainant union, working under the Republic Ship Security Agency.
(Testimony of Fernando Derupe pp. 42-43, Hearing of September 16 1957.)

* * * * * * *

“In other words, the 38 watchmen were compelled to
join the other two agencies who had bonds and resign from the
complainant union. They had to do this or help Fernando Derupe to post
a bond (which Derupe himself did not want to post) or post the bond
themselves, which they could hot afford to do.

“By imposing
the posting of the bond as a prerequisite for the reinstatement of the
strikers, the company could select agencies, which did not join the
strike, could control Derupe, their checker and employee, not to post a
bond which in fact Derupe did not post.”

Judge Bautista, as a consequence, held that defendant-respondent is
guilty of unfair labor practice in view of the circumstances of the
case. He reasoned that by imposing the condition of posting a bond on
the agency to which members of the petitioner are affiliated, and by
the refusal of the owner of the agency to post the bond, the latter as
agent of respondent rendered it impossible for the strikers to go back
to work. He, therefore, ordered the members of the union to be
reinstated with full back wages from February 18, 1956 up to their
actual reinstatement and prohibited the respondent from committing
further acts of unfair labor practice. The respondent appealed this
decision to the court in banc. On the appeal, three of the
judges of the court, Judges Lanting, Martinez and Tabigne, voted to
reverse the decision of the trial judge and to dismiss the petition for
lack of merit. The other two judges voted for the affirmance of the
decision.

From the majority decision a petition has been filed with us,
alleging that the respondent judges abused their discretion in making
findings of fact without sufficient evidence. The majority decision
found that there never was a relationship between petitioner union and
respondent Macondray and Company, Inc., and that the agencies with
which respondent had dealt with were the City Watchmen and Security
Agency, K. Tagle Ship Watchmen Agency and the Republic Ships Security
Agency. The majority further found that members of the petitioner union
who had transferred to the two security agencies which had furnished
the bond, were admitted to work, notwithstanding the fact that they
continued to be members of the petitioner union; that if members of the
petitioner union could not be employed by the respondent, it is because
the agency under which they worked, the Republic Ships Security Agency,
had not furnished the bond required of them, which bond was furnished
by the two other agencies. We believe that the above findings or
conclusions are supported by the evidence.

We also find that the demand of the respondent that the watchmen
agencies furnish a bond had become necessary in view of the fact that
on or about March 18, 1956, three guards from the Republic Ships
Security Agency left the “M/V Talleyrand,” a ship of which respondent
was an agent, without notice, abandoning their work, and then went on
strike without giving advance notice of their intention or desire to do
so. The requirement of a bond was, therefore, fully justified by the
acts of the members; of the petitioner union who were affiliated with
the Republic Ships Security Agency and who struck without previous
notice.

On the whole, therefore, we find that the majority decision is fully
supported by the evidence and by the documents and papers on the
record, insofar as it declares that respondent has not been guilty of
unfair labor practice.

Judge Bautista, in his dissenting opinion, cites the cases of United States Lines, et al. vs. Associated Watchmen and Security Union (PTWO), G.R. No. U2208-11, May 21, 1958, and Maligaya Shipwatchmen Agency, et al. vs.
Associated Watchmen & Security Union (PTWO), 55 Off. Gaz. [52]
10681, 103 Phil., 920 in which we held that watchmen and security
agencies are not contractors of the shipping agencies or shipping
companies, but are merely agents of the same in the recruitment of
guards, and that the relationship of employer and employee exists
between the shipping lines and the security guards themselves. Our
decision in the above cases has no materiality or relevance to the
question at issue in the case at bar. The refusal of the respondent to
employ guards affiliated with a security or watchmen agency that does
not furnish a bond can not constitute an unfair labor practice. Such
refusal is merely the exercise of respondent’s legitimate right to
protect its own interests, especially as the members of the petitioner
had abandoned a ship they were guarding without previous notice and
exposed the ship to losses due to theft and pilferage. It is to be
noted that the requirement of filing of a bond was not demanded from
any of the labor unions, or from the petitioner union herein. We cannot
conclude that because the respondent company refused to employ the
guards affiliated with the Republic Ships Security Agency, which
affiliates are members of the petitioner union, respondent committed an
unfair labor practice or a discrimination against petitioner union. As
the majority of the court below says, respondent never had any contract
or agreement with the petitioner union; respondent secured security
guards through the three watchmen agencies above mentioned, without
reference to the unions to which the different guards may have
pertained. The members of the petitioner union or of the shipping
agencies are not ordinary permanent and continuous employees, but
merely casual guards who are employed only when there is a ship to be
guarded and during the stay of the ship in the port of Manila. Under
the above circumstances, the judgment of the minority to the effect
that members of the petitioner union be returned to their work and paid
back wages is not justifiable.

Wherefore, we find no sufficient reasons for disturbing the findings
of the majority of the judges of the court below to the effect that the
acts of the respondent Macondray and Company, Inc. do not constitute an
unfair labor practice, and we, therefore, affirm the decision of the
said majority, with costs against the petitioner herein.

Bengzon, Montemayor, Bautista Angelo, Concepcion, Reyes, J. B. L., Endencia, and Gutierrez David, JJ., concur.
Paras, C.J., and Barrera, J., took no part.