This past Tuesday, the Valencian Government established the Social Dialogue Table and held a first meeting with representatives of the Business Confederation of the Valencian Community (CEV), UGT-PV and CCOO-PV. From the meeting, the first of the legislature, came the joint demand of the social agents and the leaders of the Generalitat to demand from the central government a leveling fund pending the reform of the regional financing system.
Likewise, it was agreed that the meetings of the Board would be at least four a year – three ordinary sessions and a monograph on budgets, compared to the minimum of one meeting that had until now – to maintain channels of dialogue between the Valencian government and the social agents. A good relationship that the previous head of the Consell, Ximo Puig, always boasted about, and that the new tenant of the Palau, Carlos Mazón, wants to consolidate and increase. Also with the unions.
This objective contrasts with Vox’s offensive in Valencia – the main city where it has government responsibilities (and a certain desire for protagonism) – against the unions. Already in the presentation of the 2024 municipal Budgets, the spokesperson for training and head of the Employment area, Juanma Badenas, boasted of having eliminated direct aid to unions.
A circumstance that the union centers warned about jeopardized the Employment Pact promoted in 2001 by the government of Rita Barberá. Although it was indicated that these subsidies would be reconsidered to avoid direct confrontation and the employers also came out supporting the unions, no rectification of Vox’s initial idea has yet been made. However, next Thursday the unions are summoned to a meeting with Badenas, from which they hope to come out with some specificity regarding the Pact, which today, they explain, remains “frozen.”
This week, one day after the photo at the Palau de la Generalitat in Mazón with the social agents, the PSPV denounced that in the city of Valencia they had begun “the dismantling of the employment network with the closure of 7 centers in the neighborhoods”.
The socialist councilor Borja Sanjuán warned of the closure of the facilities of the Mercado de Castilla, Marítimo, Patraix, Malilla, Malvarrosa, Benimàmet, La Torre and Castellar. And he attributed it to a strategy “that also affects ending social dialogue and expelling unions from the City Council’s nominative subsidies.”
The Employment Councilor responded to these words from Sanjuán, justifying the closure of some employment centers because they were not “in good condition.” Badenas pointed out that these facilities do not belong to the City Council but are rented and that it has been decided to close them because the people who work in them were in unsanitary conditions. However, the Vox leader pointed out that new locations will be sought and, until they are found, the offices that remain open will be reinforced.
For his part, Juan Carlos Gallart, Secretary of Employment of CCOO-PV, assures that the union was informed of the news by the press, “despite being patrons of the Foundation.” Thus, he assures that today the dialogue with the councilor “is null” and he hopes that the next meeting next week will serve to “redirect” the social dialogue in the city of Valencia.
