He says that it is a revolutionary measure that will make people freer: “Time is the most valuable thing for those who do not have large properties”
MADRID, 23 Jun. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The leader of Sumar, Yolanda Díaz, proposes a law to establish a maximum working day of 37.5 hours per week in 2024 and gradually reduce it until it is set at 32 hours, with social dialogue and without reducing wages.
This has been transferred by the second vice president in statements sent to the media, to emphasize that it is a “revolutionary” measure because “time is the most valuable thing” for those who do not have “large properties or important surnames”.
In this way, the candidate for the Presidency of the Government for Sumar links to the conclusions of the Foundation Study for the Time Use Law, which was recently presented to reduce the duration of the current 40 hours per week and which already proposed setting it at a first phase in 37.5 hours in 2026. However, Díaz is now accelerating those plans and promises to reach that threshold as early as next year.
The reduction of the working day is one of the main proposals of the candidacy, as Díaz had already raised in various acts, and which joins other proposals such as setting the end of it after 6:00 p.m.
The issue has also had an impact during this legislature, since Más País defended a 4-day working day while maintaining wages and the bases of a pilot project were set up to test its application. Podemos has also set in proposal documents the reduction in working time.
Now, Sumar seeks to set the reduction of the working day by the hours, with the goal of achieving a weekly time of 32 hours and applying flexibility criteria, as Díaz has also raised on other occasions.
“I want to make a proposal that is very simple, that working people can return home an hour before after their workday, to rest and sleep to be with their loved ones or to do whatever they want,” Díaz emphasized for emphasize that, with this measure, workers will be “more free”.
The leader of Sumar has stressed that “there will be people who say that the working day cannot be reduced without reducing the salary, that this is impossible”, but then she has refuted that the working time has been “always reducing as it improved the productivity”.
For example, he has given “a piece of information” to point out that in the 20th century the working day was 2,800 hours of work per year and today it is slightly below 1,700.
“The extraordinary thing is that this process has stopped 30 years ago. In Spain, an average of 300 hours more is worked than in Germany or 150 hours more than in France. Today we are not on the defensive and we want to continue advancing,” he emphasized.
Therefore, he has claimed that reducing the hours of the working day will also forge a “healthier economy” and will benefit women above all, who are the ones who “have less free time.”
