MADRID, 11 Dic. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Government, CCOO, UGT and CEOE and Cepyme will meet again this Monday, starting at 10.30 am, to continue negotiating the second leg of the pension reform after the Ministry of Inclusion, Social Security and Migrations has proposed a controversial extension of the pension calculation period from the current 25 years to a total of 30, with the discarding of the two worst years of contribution.
The last meeting of the pension social dialogue table took place on December 1. The Department headed by José Luis Escrivá defended at that meeting his proposal to extend the contribution years used to calculate the pension.
The Ministry detailed to the social agents some figures of the impact that their proposal would have. According to his calculations, extending the pension calculation period to 30 years, eliminating the two worst ones, “better protects the pensions of new entrants in the labor market against less linear work careers”, which is increasingly happening with more frenquency.
The proposal that the Ministry of Escrivá initially transferred to the CCOO, UGT, CEOE and Cepyme as a starting point for the negotiation contemplates the progressive extension of the pension calculation period in a period of 12 years, at a rate of five months per year, the worker can choose the three most favorable months for his contribution and discard two. At the end of those 12 years, the calculation period would already be 30 years.
Thus, for example, in 2027, the year in which this progressive process of extension of the calculation period would supposedly start, it would reach 25 years and five months; in 2030 it would be 26 years and eight months, and in 2038 it would reach 30 years, but with the discarding of the two worst years of contributions, with which the pension would be calculated with 28 years of contributions.
For now, the unions have expressed their rejection of extending the calculation period, alleging that it is not a recommendation of the Toledo Pact, that there is no need to do something like that, and that it does not have the necessary political support for its implementation. However, UGT has shown itself willing to study an extension of the calculation period as long as it does not imply a reduction in the pension and that it is financially neutral, as the Ministry alleges.
Likewise, in the document that was presented to the social agents a few days ago, the Government raises the possibility of linking the evolution of the maximum contribution bases to the pension revaluation criterion, that is, to the average interannual CPI for twelve months prior to December, plus an additional annual increase of 1,154 points between 2025 and 2050.
Thus, between 2025 and 2050, it is proposed that each year’s Budget laws be the ones that set the increase in the maximum bases taking into account the previous parameters (the CPI and the additional increase of 1,154 points). In the event that the average inflation that is taken as a reference to raise pensions is negative, only the additional increase of 1,154 points will be applied.
This increase in the maximum contribution bases would be accompanied by an increase in the maximum pension, although not in the same proportion. In this way, the Government proposes that the maximum pension also rise between 2025 and 2050 with the inflation reference established for contributory pensions and the minimum pension (average CPI for the twelve months prior to December), plus an additional percentage of 0.115 points , therefore lower than that proposed for the maximum bases.
As of 2050, the Ministry proposes that, within the framework of social dialogue, the additional increase to be applied to the maximum pension be determined “until a real accumulated increase of 30% is reached.”
As is also proposed for the maximum bases, if the inflation reference is negative, the maximum pension will only rise by the additional increase established (0.115 points until 2050, according to the Government’s proposal).
The Ministry of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration wants to agree with the social partners before the end of the year on these two remaining milestones to complete Component 30 of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan.
The unions have shown themselves to be satisfied with raising the maximum contribution bases and the maximum pension, although at different speeds.
The CEOE, for its part, finds it difficult to reach an agreement with the Government in this second phase of the pension reform. Its president, Antonio Garamendi, has been in favor of calling the Toledo Pact Commission to see what happens with pensions in the next 20 years. “The political parties have to tell us what we have to do,” he pointed out.
From the Ministry of Inclusion, the Secretary of State for Social Security and Pensions, Borja Suárez, has defended that the initial proposal that the Government has made to the social partners to increase the calculation period of the pension from 25 to 30 years “does not he has pulled it out of his sleeve”, since it is a commitment made with Brussels in the Recovery Plan.
