Spain: trade unions and government reach agreement to modify labour law (in brief)

An agreement has been reached by Spain’s employment ministry and the CCOO and UGT trade unions, though without the involvement of the CEOE and Cepyme employer organisations, who refused to participate in talks. According to the CCOO, the talks that began in July and came to a close this week covered a relaxing of certain key aspects of the 2012 labour reform, which introduced greater flexibility into the labour market. Magdalena Valerio, Spain’s employment minister, has settled for reaching a shared viewpoint with trade unions but remains hopeful that she can convince employer organisations to join the agreement also. She underlined her desire to expand the basis of the agreement however CEOE and Cepyme have been clear in their refusal to participate, considering social dialogue as having been broken. On the trade union side, though not having obtained a complete derogation of the 2012 reform, which limited the impact of collective bargaining, they were satisfied that some of the most emblematic aspects of the reform have been repealed, with the primacy of sector or regional collective agreements over company agreements restored, when it comes to establishing the frameworks for working time and pay, the so-called ultra-activity of collective agreements (so they remain valid beyond expiry) restored, as well as the obligation for sub-contracting firms to adopt the sector agreement that applies to its contracting company, so as to make sure outsourcing aspects of business does not lead to social dumping.