rules out touching the deindexation law

The Ministry of Finance has buried one of the last assets that Yolanda Díaz had left to try to convince businessmen to join the agreement to raise the minimum wage by 3.1% in 2026. Sources close to the first vice president and Minister of Finance, María Jesús Montero, maintain that The ministry is not willing to modify the deindexation law.

This standard, introduced in 2015, prevents companies that contract with the public administration from being able to pass on the unexpected cost increases they sufferas is the case of the increase in the interprofessional minimum wage (SMI). The aforementioned sources categorically rule out the possibility of opening their hand with this rule due to the high budgetary cost that would mean for the public coffers to allow companies to pass on these costs in the middle of the contract.

In the last meeting of the Ministry of Labor with employers and unions, Yolanda Díaz’s department promised to study a change in the law to try to seduce the employers in the face of an agreement on the minimum wage. Díaz’s right-hand man in Work, Joaquín Pérez Rey, promised the social agents “to explore with the competent ministries [Hacienda y Economía] the possibility of relaxing the indexation rules that have to do with the impact on public contracts on salaries”.

The refusal of the Treasury—which has always been wary of changing this law— buries the last remaining hope of the Ministry of Labor of closing a three-way pact for the minimum wage. The Government’s proposal to raise the minimum wage by 3.1% to 1,221 gross euros per month in 14 payments is far from the 1.5% that CEOE has put on the table and Díaz’s team has already made it very clear that it does not plan to move below that reference.

Besides, The employer’s offer was subject to the Ministry of Labor leaving the compensation and absorption rules intact. of the minimum wage. This regulation, included in the Workers’ Statute, allows companies to reduce the salary supplements of workers with payrolls slightly higher than the SMI when the Government raises it.

Yolanda Díaz and the unions They want to end this provision so that increases in the minimum wage push closer salarieswhich have not been affected by the strong increases approved in recent years. The employers’ association estimates that eliminating compensation and absorption would mean an unaffordable cost for companies and has threatened to go to court if Labor goes ahead.

A rule that unites unions and employers

Repealing the deindexation law is a old demand that social agents share for different reasons. The business side complains about the problems caused by not being able to pass on the costs incurred in the middle of the contracts, especially the salaries.

Construction companies or sectors such as lcleaning, security or general services They usually contract with the administration and, at the same time, are especially affected by increases in the minimum wage, given that they concentrate a greater number of workers who receive that remuneration.

On the other hand, Trade union organizations maintain that the deindexation law harms them when negotiating agreements groups from these sectors. They argue that employers are more reluctant to raise salaries or close agreements due to the difficulties of not being able to pass on costs to the contracts they have active.

Contracts are usually signed for periods spanning several years and The law prevents prices from being reviewed during that time except in highly priced situations.. For example, in 2022 the Government exceptionally allowed the increase in the prices of construction materials, which skyrocketed after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, to be passed on.

Except in exceptional cases like this, cost increases cannot be passed on. Let’s think, for example, of a cleaning company that was awarded a contract for the period 2022 and 2025. Between those years, the minimum wage went from 1,000 to 1,184 euros per month in 14 payments, an increase of 18.4% that represents a cost that the company cannot pass on to the administration during all that time because the law prevents it.