These are the three frictions in less than a year… the last one for the death permit

The Minister of Economy, Carlos Body, has asked to have the companies when it comes to advancing labor rights such as extension of death leave proposed this Thursday by the second vice president and Minister of Labor, Yolanda Díaz. In a press conference in Luxembourg, he assured that the Government “constantly” seeks to continue “conquering rights for workers” and “improving working conditions”, but he stressed that “a balance must be found to do it hand in hand with companies” as has already been done “in other large projects”.

This is how the head of the Economy has reacted to the proposal to extend paid work leave for the death of family members up to ten days and create a new leave for palliative care announced this Thursday by Díaz, who has announced that his department is already working on a royal decree to modify the Workers’ Statute. Without going into whether he had been informed of the measure before the announcement, he insisted that The Government’s ambition in terms of workers’ rights is “maximum”as also demonstrated by other initiatives such as the reduction of working hours. However, he stressed that these advances in rights must be undertaken with the help of companies.

“We have to find a balanced way forward that also takes into account, of course, companies and the ability they have to continue advancing in this virtuous circle that we are finding, and conquer rights and continue to be able to grow significantly,” he said.

The president of the CEOE, Antonio Garamendi, has also called for taking into account the economic cost of this measure after learning of the Minister of Labor’s announcement. The leader of the businessmen has regretted having learned of the news from the press and has described the proposal as an “occurrence”, although he has not gone into assessing the substance of the initiative. “I would ask for permission to rest for ten days from the minister’s announcements”he said ironically in a forum of the Family Business Institute of Castilla-La Mancha.

Díaz has acknowledged that the extension of the leave for the death of a family member and the creation of the new leave for palliative care has not been debated with the employers, although he has trusted that it will be well received. “I hope that businessmen take this measure with affection. It makes us a better country,” he said at an informative breakfast organized by Europa Press, where he assured that the proposal has indeed been negotiated within the Government, in the absence of specifying some details.

The unions have also criticized the minister for the fact that the announcement was made without prior negotiation with the social agents. However, both CCOO and UGT have shown themselves in favor of moving in the direction proposed by the vice president. “Spain was at the tail protection of the death of family members with excessively short permits that meant that many workers had to take sick leave, because they were not in a psychological condition to go to work with the death of a family member approaching,” said the general secretary of CCOO, Unai Sordo, who described the announcement as “good news.”

Previous crashes

This Thursday is not the first time that friction has occurred between government partners in labor matters. At the beginning of the year, The reason for the discrepancies between PSOE and Sumar in this area was the increase in the minimum wage interprofessional (SMI). Díaz tightened the rope so that this remuneration remained exempt from taxation, a fight that he waged against the first vice president and Minister of Finance, María Jesús Montero, and that he ended up winning in Congress.

Also the reduction of working hours It revealed for months the two souls of the Government. While the leader of Sumar was at all times willing to move forward with the bill with or without the support of the employers’ association – which finally ended up withdrawing from the agreement between Labor and the unions -, the socialist wing pulled the reins of the minority partner for weeks, advocating to offer incentives to businessmen with which to mitigate the economic impact of a reduction in working hours that ended up failing in Congress at the return of the summer.