He Government has agreed with the unions UGT and CCOO a draft law for reform unemployment protection in Spain – both the benefits and the subsidies that are collected when the benefit is exhausted or if you are not entitled to it – and that will now become be processed in the Congress of Deputies with the objective that it be approved as soon as possible and that Spain can thus access the fourth payment of European funds, pending arrival because this milestone was yet to be met.
“This isn’t any money,” the second vice president and Minister of Labor has made clear, Yolanda Daz, after signing the document with Unai Sordo, general secretary of CCOO, and Pepe Álvarez, his UGT counterpart. “It is a right of workers. 80% of recipients of unemployment benefits do not exhaust the benefit,” he has defended, while claiming that the norm is “deeply feminist” because the previous regulation “singularly penalized women”.
His Ministry has not been able to obtain the support of CEOE and Cepyme, which proposed measures such as requiring the unemployed to accept jobs even though they were not in the same place of residence. “There are requests that we cannot accept,” said this Monday the Secretary of State for Employment, Joaqun Prez-Rey, who still did not lose hope of counting on the employers’ associations to close a tripartite agreement.
Las employers have issued a joint statement in which they affirm that they have not participated in the signing because no negotiation has really taken place and they denounce that the Government has not presented an economic report to accompany the reform: “Our position is given because no real negotiation has taken place within the framework of social dialogue, but simply a consultation process. After the failure in the validation of the decree law in the Lower House, we have not received a new proposal from the ministry until this Monday, May 6 at noon,” they denounce.
“Furthermore, this proposal lacks economic memory, something of special gravity at a time when the General State Budgets are extended and given the economic impact of the measures included in the document. In any case, it might seem that the thoughtfulness of the process for the signing of this Wednesday (day and a half) responds more to a political strategy in the face of the elections next sunday than to the desire to reach a real agreement”, regret the organizations that chair Antonio Garamendi and Gerardo Cuerva.
What does the reform change?
Las news The main objectives of the reform are that they increase the number of protected groups (for example, it will include those under 45 years of age without family responsibilities, those who do not have enough months of contributions, returned emigrants, cross-border workers from Ceuta and Melilla, temporary agricultural workers and other groups not previously covered), the protection of those who come from full-time employment is equated with those who come from part-time employment -among whom women abound-, both benefits and the subsidy (which will be higher -90 euros more- and will now decrease as time goes by to encourage the unemployed to look for work) and makes them compatible with employment also with the same objective. As EL MUNDO has reported, they will only be from 2026, when the unemployed person has been receiving the benefit for a year and as long as the salary received in the job does not exceed 1,350 euros per month.
In addition, access to subsidies is simplified, the month of waiting between the benefit and the subsidy is eliminated, and the Government is committed to designing a plan, together with the autonomous communities, to fight against long-term unemploymentwhich mainly affects those over 52 years of age.
To know ms
The unemployment benefit will be compatible with up to 1,350 euros of salary
The unemployment benefit will be compatible with up to 1,350 euros of salary
This is the second chance given to the reform, after in January a first version of it (which had not been negotiated with the social agents) was knocked down in Congress by We can, to the surprise of the Government. This party did not accept a change that had been promoted by the Ministry of Economy then led by Nadia Calviowhich sought to reduce to 100% the 125% Social Security premium with which subsidies for those over 52 years of age are rewarded.
This extra, intended to guarantee higher pensions, was approved in 2019 when the minimum contribution base – to which that percentage applies – was much lower than the current one, since it has been growing as the Minimum Interprofessional Wage has risen. Have that plus of an additional 25% discouraged the return to the labor market, according to Economy, and also meant an increase in public spending and positive discrimination towards this group from which others did not benefit.
Podemos’s refusal to support what they considered a “cut” has now led Labor to back down and maintain that 125%, among other things because UGT and CCOO They have demanded that the norm that comes out of social dialogue must have guarantees of being approved in Congress.
The Government, in principle, had up to May 20th to approve it – since it agreed with the European Commission on a two-month extension to do so when the deadline of March 20 arrived – but the deadlines set for processing the draft bill seem to indicate that it will be impossible to meet. It remains to be seen if Brussels is satisfied that the norm has begun its parliamentary journey or if, on the contrary, it decides penalize Spain and approve for the moment a partial disbursement of the fourth payment (which would be entirely 10,000 million euros) and leaves the rest for later. The Government will have another six months to approve it and be able to receive what is missing.