Tens of thousands of people jammed the streets of Madrid on Sunday to protest against sweeping labour market reforms that make it easier to slash pay and lay off workers. Spain’s two biggest unions, the CCOO and UGT, planned protests in a total of 57 cities, including Barcelona and Seville, on Sunday against the reforms which Spain’s new conservative government argues are needed to revive the economy and slash an unemployment rate of 22.85 percent. In the Spanish capital the protesters marched under a sunny sky behind a large banner that read “no to the unfair, inefficient and useless reform”. “We have to take action. They start like this and then they will continue to eliminate rights,” said 44-year-old unemployed construction worker Victor Orgando, who wore a black hat decorated with a red CCOO union sticker. The crowd chanted “strike! strike! strike!” as it made its way from Neptune Square near the Parado Musuem to the central Sol Square. Among the participants were members of the “indignant” social protest movement that sprang up across Spain before local elections in May and teachers wearing green T-shirts with slogans against education spending cuts. Under the reform approved by Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s government on February 11, maximum severance pay is slashed to 33 days’ salary for each year worked from 45 days, going back 24 years at most. Companies no longer need prior authorisation to lodge a labour force adjustment plan, allowing employers to set the conditions for mass layoffs.
Unemployment in Spain has tripled since 2007, when it dropped to a low of 7.95 percent a year before a property bubble implosion that laid waste to millions of jobs in the construction sector.
