The strong growth of inflation during the last two years has meant that collective bargaining has so far focused on the revaluation of wages. Something that, as a collateral effect, has sidestepped another of the great labor demands: the reduction of working hours. But 2024 may imply a turning point. Once a part of the purchasing power has been recovered - albeit slight -, the union headquarters and the central government also want to focus on timetables.
Movements such as that of Telefónica and Mercadona and the agreement between the PSOE and Sumar will serve, according to the unions, to try to negotiate a reduction that employers do not see clearly, given the reduced productivity of the Spanish economy. The moderation of the CPI and wage increases will be key to getting closer to a reduction in working hours, agree from CC.OO. and the UGT During 2021 and 2022, wage growth fell short of inflation, with a loss of purchasing power of eight points. This fiscal year 2023, on the other hand, the salary increases will be greater. The average salary variation of the 3,385 agreements signed up to November is 3.49%, while inflation that month was 3.2% - the December advanced CPI puts it at 3.1% -.
If the trend continues, as the more than a thousand agreements signed so far and applicable next year seem to indicate, "it's time to open the folder", according to the workers' representatives. "Companies that have not reduced working hours below 40 hours per week must prepare for these parameters", says Mari Cruz Vicente, confederal secretary of Trade Union Action of CC.OO.
For Fernando Luján, deputy general secretary of trade union politics of the UGT, the cases of Telefónica and Mercadona will mean a before and an after and will have an undoubted "drag effect" in the world of work. The telecommunications company has agreed, as part of the ERO negotiations, to reduce the working day from 37.5 to 36 hours per week over a period of three years, very close to the 35 hours they propose to reach the PSOE and Sumar throughout the legislature. As for Mercadona, the largest private employer in Spain, with 100,000 workers, has committed in the new agreement to reduce working hours by 2025. Currently, the full day at Mercadona is set at 40 hours per week . A decline in the distribution leader will mark the step in an industry where schedules and weekend work are often grounds for complaint. Another of the points being opened is the first state agreement for the textile sector, which the unions are negotiating with the employer ARTE, where large companies such as Inditex, Mango, H
However, the employers warn of the difficulty of applying a generalized reduction. "We will see if the proposal contained in the Government agreement becomes a law or not, but, in any case, a measure of this type cannot be implemented in a uniform and homogeneous manner in all sectors, except that it has to raise within the collective bargaining", emphasizes Javier Ibars, director of labor relations and social affairs of Foment del Treball. The general secretary of Pimec, Josep Ginesta, considers that the working day "will be an affair to be dealt with company by company, and not sectorally, due to its difficulty". All this, he warns, if the moderation of inflation is confirmed next year.
