“There’s no point in trying to sell this maneuver to us; we’ve been around long enough to see through it. This idea that the government wants to negotiate is false. If they truly wanted to negotiate, they wouldn’t have immediately said that the main guidelines are already set,” stated Paulo Raimundo.
Raimundo highlighted these guidelines as involving “precariousness, temporary contracts, deregulation of working hours, and unjust dismissals.”
Speaking to the press during an engagement with Mint workers in Lisbon, the communist leader reiterated his call for the government to refrain from implementing labor law changes.
“The first step is to withdraw the labor package from discussion. It serves no good; it cannot be patched up with small tweaks. It is fundamentally flawed and must be completely discarded,” he asserted.
Paulo Raimundo further asserted that workers have the power to assert this path, “the only viable one,” since the proposed changes “do not serve the country” nor “the workers.”
“I don’t know if the government is testing who is stronger, but one thing I can guarantee, as history consistently shows, is that no matter how large the absolute majorities are, or how significant the majorities in institutional power alignments, they are not superior to the organized strength of the workers and the people. So, we will see who wins this standoff,” he proclaimed.
The communist charged the government, along with PSD, CDS, Chega, and IL, with ignoring “the reality of the country” and being “deeply influenced by those who wish to impose more precariousness, more deregulation of working hours, and those who want to dismiss without just cause, driven by major interests.”
The PCP’s general secretary accused the PSD/CDS-PP executive of “bad faith” for presenting an “inadmissible document.”
“It cannot be in good faith. The government is ignoring the reality of the country’s situation, the lives of the majority of those working and living here. It overlooks the difficult lives of those who keep the country and economy running. If it considered these aspects, it wouldn’t propose a labor package like this; it would propose one with entirely different content,” he argued.
The PCP leader challenged the prime minister to “discuss the contents, to explain to workers, especially younger individuals and women, what he intends with this labor package,” instead of “wasting time creating disputes about who is influencing whom.”
However, he anticipated that Luís Montenegro “is not interested, as it’s easier to debate how to discuss the content.”
“So, he might not want to spend time on this, but he will have to,” Raimundo emphasized.
The communist deputy acknowledged amendments are needed in the labor law to ensure “higher wages, more stability, and more time for people to live and care for their children, which is what workers demand and what the country needs.”
