The Government continues to insist on the Labor Package despite having already lost this battle in Portuguese society. It insists on the narrative of modernization and the need for reform, but the passage of time has made it increasingly clear that the insistence on the Labor Package has nothing to do with the interests of workers, much less those of new generations of workers.
Last December’s massive general strike resolved the doubts once and for all and revealed the extent of the rejection of the Labor Package. Desperate, the Government is now resorting to all kinds of methods to still be able to carry out this payment to the bosses.
The exclusion of CGTP from the negotiation process reveals the tight path the Government is on and clearly shows that the Government refuses to confront anyone who fights tenaciously in defense of workers’ rights. The Government knows that it cannot justify its proposals in comparison with this position of defending those who work.
Aware of the implications of this defeat, the Government seeks to find political and parliamentary support that will allow it not only to approve legal changes to labor laws but also to share the political cost of the profoundly negative impact they would have on the lives of millions of workers in Portugal.
The diffuse statements made on the subject by leaders and managers of the Liberal and Chega Initiative on this subject show that there may be those who are willing to accompany PSD and CDS in this social and labor offensive. Naturally, they will not do it for free, having in some cases already announced the price they can charge for this political support for the Government against the workers.
But these calculations are not tidy and cannot be done without connection with the social reality and workers’ struggle.
The demonstration that is called for next Friday, the 17th, will be another important moment to determine the outcome of this process.
This is, first and foremost, a journey to defend workers’ rights. What is at stake, first hand, is the defense of improving their working and living conditions, of a fairer distribution of wealth for those who create it every day with their work. But it is also a decisive journey to slow down those who are tempted to support this political drift of social and labor regression that big business seeks to impose via the PSD and CDS government.
For those who wonder about the solutions that should be considered as an alternative to this path of social regression of the Labor Package, the answer can be given with a simple suggestion: take the text of the Constitution – which has just completed 50 years of validity – and go through articles 53 and following. There they will find a project for the future that remains unfulfilled. Starting with paragraph 1 of 53, which reads as follows: “Workers are guaranteed job security, dismissals without just cause or for political or ideological reasons are prohibited”.
Write without applying the new Spelling Agreement
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