Paulo Raimundo took these positions at the end of a public session titled “What Women Don’t Need and Only the Struggle Can Stop,” held at Centro de Trabalho Vitória, in Lisbon.
Addressing an audience primarily composed of women, the communist leader criticized the labor laws revision proposed by the Government as a clear example of “classism,” urged for an “organized struggle” against the “offensive” of the PSD/CDS executive, and emphasized the importance of the general strike already called for December 11 by the trade unions.
“In the coming days, we have some very intense struggles to fight, it will not be the struggle of all struggles, nor the final struggle. But the general strike on December 11 is the moment to demonstrate this organized strength of working women,” he stated.
In his speech, the PCP secretary-general highlighted the only acceptable outcome for the communists regarding the Government’s proposed labor laws revision: “The only remedy it has is to be withdrawn from discussion once and for all.”
Contrary to “liberal slogans” about competitiveness, flexibility, and resilience in the economy, Paulo Raimundo framed the Government’s proposal as an “old and outdated policy, always serving a few.”
“We are facing old exploitation but based on new expressions. If this labor package has anything modern about it, it’s akin to the modern times of Charlie Chaplin,” commented Paulo Raimundo.
The PCP secretary-general further argued that behind liberal terminology, “once squeezed and stripped of all its demagoguery and hypocrisy, what always remains is more and more exploitation.”
“The labor package opens the door for employers to have even more control over the time, conditions, and wages of workers, especially female workers. They aim to further weaken the already fragile condition of working women,” he emphasized.
After warning about the consequences of extending fixed-term contracts and introducing individual time banks in law, the PCP secretary-general suggested that in terms of individual dismissal without just cause, what is foreseen could be unconstitutional.
“The formulation that wraps the dismissal without just cause is exactly afraid of Article 53 of the Constitution [about job security], to see if they can circumvent it. But they cannot, because before it reaches there, we will topple this labor package,” he declared.
In addition to criticizing the Minister of Labor, Maria do Rosário da Palma Ramalho, accused of having a “latent hatred” for parental rights, Paulo Raimundo also critically highlighted a recent intervention by the Minister of Economy, Manuel Castro Almeida, at the Web Summit.
“Amidst all that technology, the idea fell to him that the labor package implies a loss of comfort – this was the expression of the Minister of Economy. Is it the loss of comfort from the accumulation of astronomical profits of large companies? Was he referring to the comfort of banks and major distributors that keep filling up — while we pay?” he questioned.
He then shared a “certainty” about the Minister of Economy.
“If the Minister of Economy spent 15 days living with the reality of precarious work, low wages, living with difficulties, surely his concept of comfort would change quickly and drastically. Let him go experience this life for a few days,” he suggested.
In the final part of the speech, Paulo Raimundo addressed women to say they “do not need closed health services, closed or intermittent maternity emergencies.”
“They do not need and cannot live in insecurity and the constant risk of not knowing where their child will be born, whether it’s in the Moita ambulance, in a stairwell, in a private car, or on a kilometer of the highway. For women, every holy day is a day of new struggles,” he added.
