CCOO Aragón announces a concentration in defense of Public Employment

CCOO Aragón has announced this Monday the call for a concentration under the slogan ‘We continue to fight for your rights’ this next Wednesday, November 10, at 11 a.m., in front of the headquarters of the Government Delegation in Zaragoza, to demand the improvement of the conditions of workers in this sector and a reinforcement of public services.

The secretary general of CCOO Aragón, Manuel Pina, pointed out during the press conference in which the call was announced that “since the 2008 crisis” public employees “have been losing rights in their working conditions and salaries “And there has also been” an increase in temporary employment, which is greater than in the private sector. “

The union leader has demanded that the Government comply with the second Agreement for the improvement of public employment of 2018, and the agreement signed on July 5 of this year that includes the negotiation of a III biannual Agreement to continue in the improvement of public employment and of working conditions and wages, and that “it has not been respected.”

Pina has affirmed that “this is the moment, because the General State Budgets are going to be approved, which is where the conditions that are later applied in the rest of the administrations are set.”

The Secretary General of CCOO Aragón recalled that these are conditions that affect “20 percent of Social Security affiliates in the Community, who in one way or another, work for the Public Administration”, and added that Zaragoza’s call is “the first of a sustained claim” and that will continue in other locations “if there is no negotiation.”

Pina has emphasized that the loss of the number of workers in the Administrations produced in 2008 as a result of the economic crisis has been “very strong and we have seen it in the pandemic”, not only in Health, but “in the problems to manage the ERTE or to process the Minimum Vital Income “, and has requested the speeding up of public calls for employment.

Respect the agreements
On the other hand, the CCOO leader in Aragon has called for “the recovery of collective bargaining”, on which he has said that “we hope that the Administration reflects and feels” to reach agreements.

The secretary general of the Federation of Social and Health Services of CCOO Aragón, Delia Lizana, has affected the damage to public services caused by the loss of public employment after the 2008 crisis and that “has been highlighted by the coronavirus, where it has been shown that the vulnerability of these essential services after cuts in previous years “.

The union representative has estimated at “about 2,000 jobs amortized places that have not been covered” in these “recent years of cuts” in the Aragonese Health. And he pointed out that the public health job offers “are only consolidating the structural positions that are on the staff.”

Lizana has opted for “recovering social spending prior to the crisis to get closer to the countries around us”, pointing out that Spain is one of the countries with “the lowest number of public employees per percentage of inhabitants”. And it has vindicated the “obligation to guarantee the rights of citizens, which the crisis has put at risk with co-payments or difficulties in accessing public services.”

“The financing of health, social services, education and dependency must be guaranteed,” the unionist advocated, while advocating “improving the rest of the services of public administrations, clearly diminished during the period of extreme austerity “.

Lizana has listed other needs such as “increasing investments in logistics and infrastructures and social and territorial cohesion” and a greater commitment to “research, development and innovation, and digitization, training and qualification of public employees “.

Faculty
For his part, the Secretary General CCOO Teaching in Aragon, Guillermo Herráiz, has estimated a deficit of a thousand teacher positions in the Community, which are distributed in “a hundred places in Secondary” to which are added “another 900 places of support teachers for kindergarten and primary school “, which have not been covered although” new places have been created to attend to the increase in the school population in Zaragoza “.

Referring to public employment in general, he has vindicated the rise in salaries of public employees that, during the crisis “fell between 18 and 11 percent”, and has only managed to “recover four percent.”

Herráiz has lamented that “last year a rise of 0.9 percent was imposed on us, without negotiation”, which has not occurred this year either, where there will be a “increase of one hundred, which is insufficient.” “We do not renounce to continue demanding to recover the purchasing power that we had thirteen years ago,” he said.

It has also had reproaches for the educational public sector since “there is not even an equality plan, a situation that is prohibited to private companies”, in addition to other deficiencies such as the lack of development of “some parts of the basic statute of the public employee, professional careers, stabilization, mobility or telework “.

Herráiz has also remembered “people who are not civil servants but work for public companies” for whom he has requested that “a dialogue table be set up” in order to meet their demands for wages and working conditions.

Temporality
For her part, the general secretary of FSC CCOO in Aragon, Begoña Pérez Garsa, has remarked on the high percentage of temporary employment that occurs in the Spanish public administration at all levels and has advocated solving this situation, about which she has stated that “European funds could facilitate the work.”

In this sense, he has criticized that “in Aragon it is practically impossible to negotiate outside of the three large municipalities and the Government of Aragon” and has requested “a Framework Agreement for Local Administration”.

Pérez has pointed out that it is difficult to give concrete figures on the employment deficit in the general administration, but has expressed that, outside the health or education sector, “the replacement rate is zero”, and has opted to recover and extend the working day 35 hours.

From the Public Sector Area of ​​CCOO Aragón it has been stressed that it is time for these demands to be addressed by the Government of Aragon.

Improved economy
“Between 2015 and 2020, GDP has grown by 2 percent on average, public accounts in that year ended with a surplus of sixty million euros; and the spending ceiling for 2022 is the second highest in history, with 6,000 million, and the economy recovers, but the Government of Aragon continues to mistreat its employees, “Delia Lizana has reproached.

The union representative has ensured that next year’s budgets in Aragon “continue to suspend all the agreements signed prior to 2010”, and stressed that “public workers are going to suffer a loss of purchasing power that may exceed four points” .

Lizana added in this regard that “professional career agreements are still blocked, contributions will not be made to the pension plan and social action aid is cut.”

“First it was the crisis, then the budgetary stability, then the consolidation of the recovery,” said the trade unionist, who remarked that it is time to “say enough and recover the rights that have been taken from us”, so ” We call for this concentration on November 10th “.