The president of the Association of Self-Employed Workers (ATA), Lorenzo Amor, has questioned that the second vice president of the acting Government and Minister of Labor, Yolanda Díaz, advocates reforming the dismissal that does not concern “neither the workers, nor the businessmen, nor the self-employed.” The representative of the employers’ association integrated into CEOE has criticized that politicians focus on matters that “are not the concern of citizens” while there are almost three million people who face problems getting a job and are unemployed. “I invite anyone who is thinking about enduring dismissal to favor hiring,” he spoke this Monday at a press conference.
The modification of the unfair dismissal is one of Díaz’s priorities for this legislature and this has been conveyed by Sumar’s negotiating team to the PSOE. However, the position regarding this matter is not common, according to what his spokesperson Nacho Álvarez declared after the first formal meeting between both progressive leaders. The minister is aligned with the representatives of CCOO and UGT who agree on the relevance of resuming this debate that was left aside in the 2021 labor reform. However, these actors do not want to recover the 45-day compensation that is reduced to 33 for the Government of Mariano Rajoy, but to make it not predictable and to take into account the individualized characteristics of each worker at the time of dismissal.
The party led by Pedro Sánchez has not supported this initiative but has not closed itself to negotiating it either, which is why ATA reminds us that the dismissal was not part of its electoral proposals. “In recent times I am seeing that issues are appearing on the political agenda that were not in the electoral programs with which certain parties have participated in the elections. As far as I know, the PSOE did not have this issue of supporting dismissal in its electoral program” Amor has reproached. The acting president of the Government has not made reference to this issue – with a public debate focused on the amnesty – but he will meet throughout this morning with the general secretaries of the UGT and CCO, where it is foreseeable that they address it.
For the moment, the general secretary of the PSOE has not scheduled a meeting with business representatives within the framework of the round of contacts prior to the investiture debate. The president of ATA has confirmed that they have not had contacts with the Executive for the preparation of the addendum to the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan supported by Brussels a week ago. Something they regret, given that for the moment, European funds have not had an economic impact on the self-employed group, as confirmed in the latest edition of the barometer on the situation of the self-employed presented this Monday. However, Amor has recognized that this aid is contributing to the digitalization of small businesses, which will have medium-term effects.
