The Government is willing to continue cutting labor modernization to finally approve the Bases Law, but the insistence of the UCR senators on introducing two changes without consensus Union for the Homeland and part of the dialogue opposition put at risk the sanction of the initiative.
In the negotiations with the different blocks of the Senate, in which the Secretary of Labor, Julio Cordero, participates, it became clear to the representatives of the Casa Rosada that the Bases Law and the fiscal package will suffer. changes in the premises when the Upper House deals with them and in these hours they are trying to do not add in the initiatives no article that can hinder or frustrate your approval.
As a sign of goodwill, the Government I agree which, as promoted by the UCR, modify article 93, that creates the figure of “independent worker” who can be in charge of up to 5 other “independent workers” to carry out a productive enterprise: the ruling party agreed to go down from 5 to 2 “independent workers” as long as the law advances.
However, in the block of radical senators, led by Martín Lousteau, insist in two new changes that they do not have consensus in other benches and would jeopardize the sanction of the Bases Law. One is the prohibition of solidarity fees, the resource for financing unions through compulsory discounts of a sum agreed upon in collective labor agreements, and another is to re-incorporate the penalization of union blockades against companies.
Paradoxically, the version original of the Government’s labor reform, which was included in DNU 70, contemplated the limitation (and not the prohibition) of solidarity contributions and sanctions against blockades, but they were two of the articles that the libertarians accepted eliminate of the Bases Law in order to facilitate its sanction. The negotiations were piloted by Miguel Ángel Pichetto, head of the We Make Federal Coalition bloc, who managed to get the 58 articles of labor modernization will remain only in 16, without the points that were objected to by unionism. “Nothing that affects the CGT”, was the slogan of Pichetto and other dialogue opponents to justify their position.
Legislators who have a more critical stance on unionism they regret that the Government, to try to enact the laws that Javier Milei wants, continues to accept changes that are in line with the CGT’s claims when, in reality, What union power seeks is for the law to fall.
The text of the Bases Law that was approved on April 30 by the Chamber of Deputies, for example, was celebrated by Hugo Moyano and all the union leaders because the “union fund” was safe when the article on solidarity fees was eliminated and extortionist protests were also shielded since Sanctions against blockades of companies disappeared.
Other articles that were removed by the Government from the labor chapter of the Bases Law for a express order of the union leaders were the limitation of the ultraactivity of collective agreements, the regulation of the right to strike in the essential services such as education, health and transportation, changes in the regime of telecommuting and the penalization of assemblies of workers that end up becoming covert measures of force.
However, the CGT considered that, despite the drastic cutback of the libertarian labor reform, there are still points in the Base Law that “affect the rights of workers.” One that unionists consider “unacceptable” It is precisely the article that creates the figure of “independent worker.” Another is the article 91 of the initiative, which includes the “compensatory aggravation for dismissal motivated by a discriminatory act”, but, according to the union leadership, it does not establish a “comprehensive reparation” for the layoff and “does not determine reinstatement” of the worker.
The CGT also questions a series of modifications included in the Bases Law in the labor regime of public employees. The text approved in Deputies, for example, maintains intact the limitation for unions to collect the solidarity fee through the collective agreement, by requiring that non-affiliated workers provide their express authorization for it to be deducted.
The atmosphere before the discussion of the Bases Law in the Senate is enormous uncertainty. If the initiative is rejected, it cannot be debated again for one year. And if it returns modified to Deputies, they must vote yes or no each of the changes. The third option is the one that everyone already They ruled out: that the Senate approves the texts approved by the Lower House and they become laws.
