The employers’ organization is leaning towards “no” to the reduction in working hours that the government intends to approve. After Labor presented yesterday Tuesday the “latest” offer from the executive to businessmen, with aid to SMEs of up to 6,000 euros, the leader of the CEOE declared that “under no circumstances will we let’s share the pure interventionism of the government. “, which he accuses of encouraging small businesses to “jump off a cliff.”
Thus, everything indicates that employers will therefore withdraw from this regulation, even if there is still no definitive “no” from the employers’ association, since the organization is still waiting for the details of this latest offer . “We are still undocumented,” criticize the CEOE sources interviewed by this media.
The president of the CEOE, Antonio Garamendi, criticized this Wednesday what he described as a “triultimatum” from the Ministry of Labor to employers to support the reduction of the working day from the current 40 hours per week to 37.5 hours in 2025 .
“Let them do what they have to do, but I have the right, as a representative of Spanish companies, especially in this case small ones and self-employed workers, to say what we think and that is bad for the economy and for small businesses,” Garamendi said, as reported by the Europa Press agency.
“In no case are we going to share the pure interventionism of the government,” added Garamendi, asked expressly about the request of “number two” of Yolanda Díaz that on November 11, the entrepreneurs say “yes or no” to this “last “. government offer.
Without tripartite agreement in the social dialogue, the Ministry of Labor warned that the Executive would seek an agreement with the unions to submit the legislation “as soon as possible” to the Council of Ministers and Parliament, where the government will have to obtain the support necessary. to move it forward. Key partners such as the PNV have said they will support reducing the working day to 37 and a half hours, but there is no certainty about what will happen with other groups, such as Junts.
Demands that “agreements be respected”
However, the business leader continues to throw a question into the air, which suggests a possible path of rapprochement between the parties. “Instead of continuing to go around in circles and getting lost, are the agreements going to be respected or are the agreements not going to be respected? That’s the word,” said Antonio Garamendi.
This “compliance” with the agreements to which Garamendi refers translates into a delay in the reduction of working hours that the Labor law intends to approve and apply in 2025. This would mean that the agreements already signed would remain in force according to the agreed schedules. . Once expired, the new regulations would come into effect.
“I cannot sign on behalf of 4,500 agreements that will be broken tomorrow and businesses will accept what the ministry says in this matter. Very sorry. When the ministry is wrong, when we think it is wrong, when we think it is causing great damage to the Spanish economy, we must say that we do not share it,” Garamendi emphasized.
However, this does not appear to be a real possibility of an agreement. The agreements have different validity periods, in many cases two or three years, which would imply a significant delay in the reduction of working hours, “the most important rule of the legislator”, in the words of the Secretary of State at work, Joaquín, yesterday Pérez Rey.
Furthermore, in the Labor Party they maintain a firm position on the application of the reduction of the working day in 2025, since it is a commitment concluded in the government agreement between the PSOE and Sumar, in which Yolanda Díaz feels reinforced by the president of the government. , Pedro Sanchez.
Accusations of encouraging SMEs to “jump off the cliff”
Labor demanded that employers abandon their political positions and focus on the “interests” of small businesses. Yolanda Díaz warned that the aid offered by the government is conditional on a regulatory agreement. Therefore, these will decrease if businessmen withdraw from negotiations.
The Executive proposed direct aid of up to 6,000 euros to microSMEs in five sectors (hotels, commerce, hairdressing, cleaning and agriculture), as well as bonuses for new hires in companies with fewer than 10 employees following the enforcement of the law 37. -hour of work per day and average.
“It is surprising that they do not want to respect the validity of the agreements, interventionism in its purest form which tells you that you have to accept what they say because otherwise you are not taking care of small (businesses). ). “But what are you telling me?” criticized the CEOE president.
Garamendi said that with the reduction of the working day, the government is “encouraging small businesses to jump off the cliff.” “They tell you: I’m going to give you subsidies, which I don’t know what they are about, they haven’t told us the timetable yet, we still don’t know absolutely anything about it, but they say you, I’m going to give you a parachute. And no, he gives you an umbrella so he can kill you directly, and that’s what’s going to happen,” the business leader said.
The CEOE leader stressed that the Labor proposal for direct aid was estimated at a cost of 350 to 375 million euros for half a million businesses and that “it doesn’t work”, as he declared that “this would mean 700 or 800 euros” per company.
