MADRID, 12 Jun. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Spanish employers’ association and the unions have asked that the agreements reached in the framework of social dialogue in recent years be respected in the event that after the next appointment with the polls on July 23 there is a change of Government in Spain.
Both for the president of the CEOE, Antonio Garamendi, and for the general secretary of the Workers’ Commissions, Unai Sordo, and the general secretary of the UGT, Pepe Álvarez, the two- and three-way pacts that have been reached in this legislature are a guarantee of social peace, so they must be preserved in the long term as they are part of the constitutional mandate of the social agents and respond to the interest of society.
“The pacts are to be stable over time and they have to go to the end. We will ask for respect and we will defend them. What is signed is signed,” Garamendi said during his speech at the joint round table organized by Cinco Días within a few days on the occasion of its 45th Anniversary.
The consolidation of this process of social dialogue in recent years will make it possible to position Spain as a country in which one can have “great confidence”, in the words of the UGT leader, as it has both legal and social stability.
Thus, in his opinion, whoever wants to act outside of this context must explain it, since the public “cannot be fooled”. In this sense, Unai Sordo has also expressed himself, considering it “totally absurd” that the unions are not included in a hypothetical government of which the ultra-right is a part, as he has commented is the case in Castilla y León.
“If the ultra-right enters the Government there will be a union offensive without any doubt. I fear for the Preliminary Title of the Constitution. The irruption or excessive importance of the extreme right and extreme right-wing populism is a risk for our country,” has manifested.
Thus, both unions and employers have encouraged not to leave this framework of social dialogue. According to Garamendi, although there are “many hairs on the cat flap”, an agreement “goes much further” than something without an agreement and in recent years important agreements have been reached that provide peace of mind and stability to citizens and companies. “Social dialogue is articulated and works in Spain”, he affirmed.
“Social dialogue is a compromise formula that allows us to advance less than what we all want or can, but with much more firmness”, Pepe Álvarez has shown for his part.
