Thousands protest in Spain for shorter working hours

Spain map. INQUIRER FILES/STOCK IMAGE

MADRID, Spain — Thousands of people took part in union-led protests across Spain on Thursday, September 26, to push for progress in talks between the government and the business sector to reduce working hours.

Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s minority coalition government wants to reduce the working week to 37.5 hours from the current 40 hours, saying it would boost productivity and improve work-life balance.

It launched talks with employers’ groups and unions in January to reach a deal but the discussions have stalled with businesses opposed to a uniform reduction in the working week, arguing different sectors face distinct needs.

Blowing whistles and waving red and white union flags, several thousand people rallied across the country outside the offices of the CEOE and Cepyme business associations, which respectively represent large and small companies, to push for progress in the talks.

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The protests were organized by Spain’s two largest unions, UGT and CCOO, which want the government to push ahead with the reduction in working hours even if it fails to reach a consensus with business groups.

“The CEOE is pursuing a delaying tactic,” the secretary general of the CCOO, Unai Sordo, said in an interview with Spanish public radio.

“We would prefer a tripartite agreement” between the government, unions and employers but “if the CEOE persists in this stalemate” we will ask the government to implement it regardless, he added.

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UGT leader Pepe Alvarez said there are “no grounds” to oppose shorting working hours.

“A company is not more productive when it has longer working days, on the contrary,” he added on social network X.

The government’s plan calls for the working week to be reduced first to 38.5 hours in 2024 and then t0 37.5 hours in 2025, without a loss of pay.

The proposal also faces opposition from some of the smaller parties which Sanchez’s minority government relies on to pass legislation, including the Catalan separatist party JxCAT, which is close to business groups, making its adoption uncertain.