Government Confirms That Yolanda Díaz Will Lead The Negotiation On The Labor Reform

Moncloa confirmed this Tuesday that the Ministry of Labor headed by the second vice president, Yolanda Díaz , is the one who “leads” the table of social dialogue in which the reform of the labor market is addressed , but that there should also be “other” ministries that “are affected” by this new action, and that a mechanism is being sought to coordinate the parts of the Government involved.

“Who leads is the Ministry of Labor”, but it is also “reasonable that members of other departments participate in that table , ” said the Minister of Territorial Policy and spokesperson for the Executive, Isabel Rodríguez. It is about “improving the method to have maximum coordination,” the spokeswoman reiterated when faced with questions from journalists at the press conference after the Council of Ministers.

He advocated ” maximum dialogue and the greatest consensus ” for this measure, which is “such a momentous reform, not a counter-reform” that the Government will work to make it a reality before the end of the year, thus fulfilling its ” commitment”.

“The first vice president herself is the one who has said that it is part of each department to take charge of its sectorial tables,” Rodríguez remarked, after the accusations of “interference” launched from the Second Vice Presidency to the Minister of Economy in this matter.

The spokeswoman, who first tried to do “pedagogy” about what a coalition entails, stressed that she does not believe “that any member of the Government wants this reform to have its own name” because “it is a reform of the entire Government that at first the president assumes “from his” inauguration debate “and that” is later translated into the coalition agreement, “he concluded.

“We prefer an agreement of all,” acknowledged Rodríguez, when asked if the reform would go ahead if any of the social agents were missing.

Sources from La Moncloa argue that the differences between the partners “is not a matter of content or deadlines , but of who coordinates”, so they are “stringing together coordination mechanisms inside and outside the table”, seeking, they admit, ” mechanisms to improve coordination, as a result of the depth of the reform “, for the” before, during and after the social dialogue table “.

It is a ” debate on the methodology ” because even in the detail of the reform there are “more coincidences between companies and unions” than it seems, the Executive highlights.

The intention of La Moncloa is to reach an agreement today on that coordination before the appointment in the social dialogue that there is tomorrow, Wednesday, as usual every week for months, between representatives of Labor, the employer’s association and the unions to negotiate the legislative proposal that the Government wants to close with the “maximum consensus” before the end of the year.

“We prefer an agreement of all, which gives satisfaction to the social dialogue table”

Economy, as the department in charge of coordinating the Government’s economic policy, chairs the social dialogue table where all the sectoral tables converge. The differences between Calviño and Díaz jumped because the latter had presented proposals at its sectoral table on labor market reform without having previously negotiated them in the Government.

Now from La Moncloa they are looking for how to establish those coordination mechanisms in this final stretch of the negotiation on the new regulations to regulate the labor market.

The spokesperson stressed that they prefer “an agreement of all, which gives satisfaction to the social dialogue table, unions and employers. We would like to achieve the objective of maximum dialogue for the greatest consensus with all,” Minister Rodríguez stressed , before conclude that the two formations that make up the Government “agree” to change the labor reform imposed by the Popular Party in 2012.