The swords are still high between the lawyers of the administration of Justice (formerly judicial secretaries) and the Ministry of Justice. Two months after the start of that indefinite strike, the positions to find a solution to this unprecedented conflict are still very far away.
And, with each passing day, the bill charged to citizens for this strike increases. The figures provided by the lawyers are extremely worrying. There are already close to 400,000 lawsuits pending distribution and suspended trials and hearings are around 330,000. To which must be added the around 1.5 million euros blocked in the accounts of the courts and that would have to be in the pocket of the citizens.
Those are the figures given in real time, but those court secretaries, who say they are “disconcerted and surprised” by the response that Justice is giving to this strike, predict that it will take “at least between 12 and 16 months to recover the normality in those judicial venues”.
The lawyers warn that returning to the situation prior to the start of the strike “is going to cost more money than what they are now asking for, since shock plans will have to be applied.”
The court clerks insist that they only ask that “the agreement agreed with the Government in April 2022” be fulfilled. The Ministry of Justice then promised, they recall, “to link the remuneration of lawyers to that of judges and prosecutors, proposing an increase of at least 75%. The salary of judicial lawyers – they specify – is 83% of that of judges and prosecutors, but their supplements, on which the salaries mainly depend, barely exceed 50%.
It was also agreed to “reduce population groups, benefiting colleagues who were in populations where less was charged (third category in towns).” These lawyers claim “not to remember” another conflict in which “it is necessary to call a strike to comply with what has already been agreed.”
At what point are the negotiations now? According to these professionals, Justice does not move a comma from its initial proposal. The Government offers “a raise of less than 50% of what was promised to 30% of the workforce; an increase of 120 euros per year to 13% of the workforce; and zero euros of salary adequacy for 67% of the workforce”. So, criticize the organizers of the strike, “despite the fact that all the lawyers have assumed the same powers, that 67% have to work for free.”
These lawyers directly accuse the Government of “intoxicating the Spanish population with falsehoods, with the sole purpose of turning citizens against us.” And they list some of those, for them, falsehoods. “It is flatly false that our salary has been raised by 15% and that they are one of the bodies that have had the highest salary increases.” And they add that “the only exclusive increase for the secretaries has been the one agreed by the ministry and unions on November 15, which amounted to 195 euros per month, “which means a rise from 4% to 6% of our salaries.” They also call it false “that they request a linear salary increase of 1,100 euros.” They assure that with a “much lower amount the conflict could be closed”.
The distance between the two positions was again manifest this past Thursday. The Minister of Justice, Pilar Llop, assured that judicial lawyers must explain why they are on strike and maintain “maximalist positions”, since their salaries are going to be increased by almost 15%. “Everyone has the right to adopt collective conflict measures if they consider that their working conditions are not adequate, but they may have to explain what is not appropriate in a salary increase of 14.76%,” Llop settled in a commission in Congress held this past Thursday.
