On the day that the new rules of the Decent Work Agenda take effect, the CGTP will take to the streets in the hope that the social protest that has visibly increased in recent months will be reflected in the traditional May Day parade. There is no shortage of reasons for protest, says Intersindical’s secretary general, and they are not being diluted by the changes to labor laws that take effect from today.
Since the beginning of the year, the opposition’s escalation has been evident, as evidenced by the figures already known from strike announcements for the months of January and February. In the first month of the year, according to data from the Directorate-General for Employment and Industrial Relations 204 strike notices were issued, the highest number in the last ten years for the same period and that is a quadrupling of the January 2022 values. In February, the number of previous strike announcements fell to 79, still well above 48 a year earlier. In total, there were 283 prior cancellations in the first two months of the year. Teachers, doctors, nurses, pre-hospital, diagnostic and therapeutic emergency room technicians, court officers, transportation workers, civil servants in general – strikes have swept across numerous sectors from the public to the private. Work stoppages were accompanied by other points of contention, translated into the Just Life demonstrations, promoted by various social movements, and the Right to Housing protest in early April.
“More wages, more rights, better pensions! Against the rise in the cost of living”, is the motto with which the CGTP takes to the streets today, for “a great day of national struggle, with workers filling the streets and squares from north to south of Portugal and in the autonomous regions,” the Intersindical statement said. Isabel Camarinha denounces a scenario of impoverishment of workers and the general population of Portugal, a working model of “uncertainty, long and unregulated hours, disinvestment and underfunding of public services”. “It is by no means inevitable that this will happen. It is possible to guarantee the dignity of life for everyone in our country. The wealth we produce is enough to guarantee this dignity of life. It is very poorly distributedas evidenced by low wages and pensions and, on the other hand, by billions of euros in profits, which continue to rise in large companies and economic groups,” says the Secretary General of the CGTP. see that prices do not fall, the government has proposed a series of measures that are very short and inadequate and that do not get to the root of the problem, which do not guarantee that workers, retirees and pensioners will have more income to deal with this situation in order to develop the country’s economy”. Especially since, adds Isabel Camarinha, in Portugal “the micro, small and medium internal market, are not the ones who make billions of euros in profits. These companies will also not survive if there is no purchasing power among the majority of the population.”
For the leader of Intersindical, who says he hopes that the social protest that is gaining momentum will also be noticed on May 1, measures of the Decent Work Agenda, “do not solve the problems of unbalanced working conditionsmaintains the expiration of collective bargaining agreements, does not reinstate the principle of more favorable treatment of the worker, maintains long and unregulated hours”.
With the two trade union centers with, as usual, separate agendas, UGT returns this year to celebrate May 1 at the Tower of Belém, in Lisbon, in a concentration that according to the trade union center will “bring hundreds of union leaders and workers together for a big party”. Faced with the rise in the cost of living, UGT and its unions will determination in the fight for more and better wages, for more social dialogue, for decent pensions and for more youth employment”, refers to the trade union center in a communiqué. Interventions will take place in the early afternoon by the Secretary General of UGT, Mário Mourão, and the President, Lucinda Dâmaso.
Source: DN
