The employers rejects the proposal put on the table by the Ministry of Labor to reduce the working hours to a legal maximum of 37.5 hours per week. CEOE held an extraordinary Executive Committee meeting this Tuesday to set its position on what the Government has warned will be its “last offer” to try to reach a tripartite agreement with employers and unions. At its last meeting last Tuesday, the Executive asked the social partners to give a definitive “yes or no” on the proposal before November 11, and the employers have already made a decision. CEOE and Cepyme are not in favor, considering that the generalized cut in working time “makes little sense” and that its modification by law is an “interference” in collective bargaining between employers and unions.
“The extraordinary Executive Committee of CEOE has unanimously rejected the Ministry of Labor’s proposal for a legal reduction in working hours,” the business organization announced in a joint statement issued together with Cepyme, which also supports the rejection. “CEOE and Cepyme, from responsibility, cannot support this proposal”, they stress.
Employers argue that the reduction of working time by law that the government intends to undertake involves an “interference in the autonomy of collective bargaining”.. They believe that this issue is an “own matter” of collective bargaining agreements and therefore it is not necessary to legislate on it, but it has to be addressed bilaterally by social partners and employers. “The approval of this regulation only weakens the collective bargaining framework that has been fundamental in maintaining social peace over the last 40 years,” say CEOE and Cepyme, who add that there are already agreements with agreed working hours of 37.5 hours per week.
In this sense, the employers’ associations advocate that working time cuts should be debated within the companies and the different sectors, in order to take into account their own characteristics. “Adopting measures such as this in general makes little sense. if we take into account the enormous difficulties that exist between the different economic sectors and between autonomous communities”, they argue. CEOE and Cepyme assure that the reduction of the working day by law will force many companies, especially SMEs and SMEs, to reduce their working hours. self-employedto a forced reorganization that will put its internal organizational capacity and its survival to the limit”.
The latest proposal put forward by the Ministry of Labor to reduce the working day to 37.5 hours contains precisely those measures aimed at small and medium-sized companies. The latest development included last week by the department of Yolanda Díaz includes direct aid of up to 6,000 euros for companies with less than five workers. in the commerce, hotel and catering, hairdressing, cleaning and agriculture sectors that are affected by the reduction of working hours. According to Labor, the objective of “stimulating” productivity in these lagging sectors with “more efficient” operating formulas such as e-commerce or the digitalization of time recording systems.
“In companies with such reduced workforces, the productivity gain is the best element to face the reduction of working hours, because the creation of employment is perhaps more difficult”, defended in this sense the Secretary of State for Labor, Joaquín Pérez Rey. However, the employers’ association does not see this increase in productivity as possible. “It will be difficult to increase productivity from the reduction of the working day. in a productive fabric made up of around 98% of SMEs and the self-employed, and where the sectors with the greatest contribution to GDP are linked, among others, to services and tourism,” CEOE and Cepyme point out in their joint communiqué.
In addition to the direct aid to micro-SMEs offered at the last meeting -which the Government estimates could benefit 470,000 companies with a total investment of between 350 and 375 million euros-, Labor’s offer also includes a plan of accompaniment and advice to small and medium-sized companies with less than 10 workers. affected by the reduction of working hours, as well as bonuses of between 20% and 100% for the conversion of part-time contracts into full-time jobs and for permanent contracts. With these measures, the Government has tried to bring closer positions with the employers, but the employers have reaffirmed this Tuesday in their refusal.
An agreement with the unions
The Secretary of State for Labor has stressed this Tuesday that the rejection of employers will not stop the Government’s intention to reduce the working day to 37.5 hours, as PSOE and Sumar agreed in the government agreement. Diaz’s department is willing to move forward with the cut in working time only with the unions.The government’s approach, which also envisages regulating the right to disconnection and modifying the time register, is welcomed by the unions.
“We will seek an agreement with the trade union organizations to move as soon as possible to the Congress of Deputies this capital reform,” Pérez Rey said at a press conference when asked, hours before the employers’ position was known, what the ministry would do in the event that the employers maintained their refusal. “We will try to get the unions present at the table to support us,” he insisted, pointing out that without the employers some of the measures proposed to bring positions closer to the employers may fall in the negotiation with UGT and CCOO. “Naturally, in order to reach an agreement with the trade union organizations, we will have to establish some measures in the text that will accommodate what the trade union organizations are asking for,” he explained.