the rights on the bench

The attack on labor rights, the easing of work and the increasingly brutal methodology of layoffs, have intensified over the past year, for the sake of the national government – and of the entrepreneurial claim – to resume the charge with a labor reform project that the ruling party had been promoted for the first time in 2017 after the mid-term elections, which proposed to get to the bottom of things and to directly modify the labor law (No. 20 744) which currently governs Argentina. Although the offensive could not be achieved due to the strong resistance of unions and certain political sectors, the unions agree that several objectives of this initiative have already been achieved, since They operate "de facto" with the consent of the authorities. job

Union representatives and local labor lawyers warn about this panorama and resist not only the "modernization" evoked by the national government and Allied businessmen, but also the accession of the provincial government to the national law on the risks of work (ART). , which they interpret as another element of this change in the regulation of labor relations.

A sample of this resistance was presented this week by the transport unions of Rosario, who adhered to the figure of the Argentine Confederation of Transport Workers (Catt) and ran a major demonstration of opposition and various ongoing and organized mobilizations. the trade union radiations in the region, which have converged in common manifestations after a long period of divergence, precisely with the opposition to labor reform as a unifying slogan.

With the IMF stimulator in place, the national government and some aligned sectors of the ruling party continue to promote the so-called legal instrument without hiding their intention to advance agreements, facilitate conditions for dismissal, reduce costs of manpower and suppress strike, among others. All this, on the grounds that a change in the labor legislation would allow the growth of employment and production, which "relies little on empirical evidence," according to the Observatory of Public Policies of the University of Paris. Avellaneda (see below). ).

In every attempt to enact labor legislation, "the characteristics are always the same: lower labor costs, employer contributions, and thus the financing of government coffers and the relaxation of contracts and contracts. working hours. The current attack is almost similar to that of 2017. What I notice, it is an attack on unionism in its frontal form, not only for the persecution of leaders, but for a media campaign of demonization of the unionism. Apart from the fact that there are leaders who react to bureaucracies or who are corrupt, it is ultimately the unions that are the only ones able to defend and resist this attack that they have the intention of To install to make labor law more flexible in Argentina, "said Luciana Censi, counselor. union and member of the Rosario Association of Labor Lawyers.

For the lawyer specialized in labor law, teacher and trainer Osvaldo Di Prinzio, in relation to previous advances in labor law modification, "this would give the impression that the" innovations "sought by this reform consist in reduce labor costs by facilitating layoffs without reason, directly reducing or eliminating benefits, allowing the worker to set up a reserve fund with his salary or at the expense of the employer to pay compensation , reduce costs while reducing the rules of hygiene and safety work and facilitate the laundering of workers with minimal costs for the employer, which would be detrimental to retirement, as the income from 'Ansés would be reduced, in principle this seems to correspond to the one raised in 2017,' he said.

From now on, "the government will try to incorporate or modify in the normative plexus all that it could not achieve during these almost four years of mandate. Unfortunately, however, I feel that it has already achieved its greatest goal in labor relations, which was created with radical devaluation. In fact, this administration sees the worker as a cost. In this sense, it has already achieved its goal of reducing this cost in terms of international values, "said Pablo Cerra, legal representative of the Rosario delegation of the Metallurgical Workers Union (UOM). ).

Thus, although he did not get the final sanction of a labor reform, the government "did not fail," said Jorge Elizondo, vice president of the Labor Lawyers Association of Rosario. On the other hand, "this has been successful, a lot of progress has been made since 2016," he added. "De facto flexibility, a reform based on double-digit unemployment growth," he said.

"From the beginning, it was a preconceived plan, because with two figures, the chances of forcing the worker to accept lower pay conditions are greater." The growth of the legion of unemployed determines a reduction of salary which was the first objective of the government of Mauricio Macri and thus reached the top of the most backward countries of the region. And they succeeded: we are now under Chile, "he said.

Elizondo said, "This latest attack is more furious, more radicalized. It is a fierce reaction that tends to impose, however, how the flexibility of work becomes all that the IMF intends to do by Argentina, that is to say, to adapt its labor law, which they consider too rigid , to the specific needs of financial capital. If labor law subsists, it must be as flexible as possible, the power of absolute enterprises and work must adapt to its objectives.

Layoffs

Censi pointed out as characteristic of the recent period "brutality at the time of the unprecedented dismissal: they are carried out en mbade, without any explanation on the part of the State, the society, nor the justification, nor only by a reorganization of the work process within the company. " factories, "he detailed.

Given this, Elizondo said that in this third attempt at labor reform, there was talk of the disappearance of compensation in case of dismissal, which has already occurred in countless cases , with unexpected closures, the dissolution of companies and abandonment by employers, without even dealing with crisis procedures before. In such cases, labor lawyers point out that there is a legal vacuum in this respect, in the absence of specific laws that criminalize this type of procedure.

Witness the unscrupulous statements of the head of the Argentine Chamber of Construction (CAC), Julio Crivelli, who, along with businessman Martín Cabrales, called for two weeks ago to advance labor reform to "be able to lay off without compensation", as in the United States, to reduce costs and increase productivity, by allowing employees to be replaced by "better" workers.

"There is no typification of these employer behaviors, there is a legal vacuum with regard to the control they should exercise over them and the sanction that these companies should have at the time of mbad dismissal. National states and, in some cases, the provinces even accept mbadive or mbad redundancies without any administrative procedure or violation of their nature, because they sign crisis prevention procedures that are not. Labor ministries or collective redundancies are signed without recourse to prior administrative procedures, "warned Censi, adding that" discriminatory dismissals are also observed for the most active activists or those who wish to organize their collective in their workplace . They are the first target of the dismissal. "

Moreover, in the official labor flexibilisation projects, the cessation fund is mentioned, as in the construction sector since 1967, under which, at the time of the dismissal, the employer pays 12% of the salary. . first year and 8% after. Proponents of the substitution of pay for this system say that by reducing the cost of layoffs for firms, employers would be encouraged to hire more workers.

"If this were generalized, it would be the disappearance of the last legal barrier designed to protect the worker against arbitrary dismissal, in clear violation of Article 14 bis of the Constitution. We understand that the real protection against this lies in the stability that allows the ownership of the job, as long as no economic disciplinary cause justifies a dismissal. Until now, the Supreme Court has not changed this concept and there are international treaties, declarations and covenants to which Argentina has adhered and which must be respected because they are part of the constitutionality . I think this attempt is indefensible, "said the vice president of the local legal badociation.

Bad word

Modernizing is the word most used to justify the need to reformulate labor agreements and cope with new forms and working relationships marked by technology. "Reforming would not be a bad word, since it can be reformed to expand rights, the problem is that in this case, we seek to reduce the rights or to violate them directly. And this has been done since the beginning of the current government, but by amending the agreements in critical areas such as oil exploitation by hydraulic fracturing, the dairy industry crisis and the opening indiscriminately electronic products, with reduced rights. The best examples are Vaca Muerta, the dairy basin with the disappearance of the cooperative Sancor and Tierra del Fuego. Anyway, we try to change the norms that place the worker in a situation of greatest weakness vis-à-vis the most powerful part of the employment relationship, he can not have a favorable opinion » said Di Prinzio.

"We should see what the word modernize means for those who are in favor, because if they understand that it is to go back in time, at the end of the 19th century or at the beginning of the 20th century, the modern n ' to nothing. If the goal is to abolish workers' rights, remove all forms of stability and the living and mobile minimum wage, we are absolutely against it, "said Elizondo. And he said that "the unions do not refuse new technologies, but rather the opposite, because incorporating them should in no way mean a loss of rights, on the contrary, it should reduce the working time, it would be better distributed and better conditions would be created to incorporate them, no wage reduction. "

According to Di Prinzio, the new labor standards in developed countries, especially in Europe, "are dynamic and adapt to the social and economic reality of each country, but they never seek the contraction of rights, but on the contrary, they are progressing for better results. working conditions and the reduction of damage to workers' health, and not a regularization of work with regressive standards ".

"New technologies, new forms of work (such as telecommuting), gender-specific content, among others, require serious debate and therefore reform if you wish. But this can never be done to the detriment of the workers. For this, it is necessary to strengthen the labor institutions, the unions that are the fundamental banner of the defense of workers' rights. The countries where workers have the highest rights (Nordic) are those with the highest union density in the world. For this reason, the debate is welcome, namely that it strengthens trade union institutions and that they generate more rights for workers and never back down, "said the lawyer of the 39; UOM.

Whatever the case may be, for the lawyer specialized in labor law, Maria Eugenia Caggiano, "it is time to start a debate with ideas that reproduce new formulas that favor the success of savings. regional, national industry and, basically, who reaffirm the permanent suitability of the employment relationship ensure the safety and legal protection of workers. The others have already been tested and have not worked. "

"The old formulas continue to be replicated. It is not possible to envision a transformation of the world of work that continues to sit at the table of workers, which persists in preventing their participation in all areas of the world of work when statistics show that women are more women. formal and informal jobs, "said the professional.

Against the unions

For the lawyer and adviser of the Federation of Workers of the Petroleum Industry of Argentina, Carlos Zamboni Siri, as part of the "research aimed at bringing the capital-labor relationship back to the world." State before the existence of labor law, the ultimate goal is to eliminate any kind of intermediation between the individual worker and the employer, that is, to say labor legislation and collective action through trade unions, which constitute an obstacle to the implementation of the old neoliberal recipe. This is why, in parallel with the reform, we are witnessing an intensification of the direct attack of the national government against the unions ".

In this sense, Censi observed that "unlike the reform of the 1990s, there is now a frontal and brutal attack on trade unionism, which is not only caused by the persecution of leaders, but also by a campaign of demonization in the media. For example, they are the only ones who can defend themselves and resist the badault they intend to put in place to make labor law more flexible in Argentina. "

For Elizondo, this characteristic is precisely "a central objective of the government: to completely liquidate trade union power. And if they do not disappear, they turn into a sort of temperance league. This concerns the liquidation of collective agreements by activity, which are the majority in our country, and replace them with sectoral agreements. (Mauricio) Macri talks about the modernization of agreements, he talks about it. And another goal is that there are no more common members, because if there are any, there is a salary increase, that's because workers can reach it with combat power. "

More flexibility

Within the range of deregulation methods currently underway, Cerra pointed out that one of the most common methods is the validity of waste contracts, independent or autonomous fraudulent figures, in which a typical working relationship is masked like another labor law "This is not new, but in the face of economic needs and in times of crisis, these numbers are used. Today, a person thinks first to feed his family, then to defend his rights, it makes sense, but it is not fair. The situation in which we live is a fertile ground for the implementation of reforms such as this one. I therefore reiterate that resistance, institutionalized and organized, would be the most effective way of avoiding such abuses. "

Elizondo agreed that "outsourcing is widespread and that the flexibility of the work is based on platforms, applications that hide the working relationship. It is obvious that the aim is to conceal a working relationship by supposedly independent work. This forces workers to organize and create new unions ".

Di Prinzio cited as examples of precariousness and flexibilization and its consequences for the Tierra del Fuego industry, where "for two years, they are not reopened jointly, a suspension with wage reduction is allowed, and only 140 hours per month are guaranteed (previous agreement 200 hours), which generated 9,000 layoffs and registered the highest unemployment rate in the country. At Vaca Muerta, the collective agreement for the activity has been modified, with the introduction of multitasking, changing the break schedule and the creation of a surplus of hours worked that distracts and tires the worker and contributes there is an accident, reaching 8 deaths in 15 months of the new labor regime. "

In addition, "in the dairy sector, outsourcing and multitasking are facilitated, which increases work accidents. All this would show that there is a direct relationship between flexibilization and redundancies and employment insecurity problems, and that the reduction in the number of jobs registered would facilitate the growth of flexible jobs. " concluded the professor in labor law.

"Flexibility methods are not new, except that workplace fraud is hidden by new technologies. The loss of rights is recognized in the workplace and the role of States in crisis prevention procedures is fundamental here. There appears to be a fired area and workers are forced to resign. rights that are by inalienable constitutional mandate. Of course, the fall in real wages and employment is the main precarious factor in the labor market, "said Zamboni Siri.

Smoke screen

For Caggiano, "the moment to discuss the labor reform is over. The proposal presented by the government in 2017 had the opportunity to be discussed in Congress. It should be noted that a few days after the elections, which will determine the continuity of this model, the announcements concerning this reform will be posted again on the billboards. It is that "from the executive power, there has been no official communication. It seems that the real recipients of this announcement are the administrators of the macro-economy (European Union, IMF), main supporters of this model, "said the professional.

On the other hand, there is still a media staging of the reform of work by political operators and which, a few days after the Paso, seems rather to be a movement of distraction pretending to avoid looking at the real and important and that the transformation / reform of the world of work has taken place in the life that comes out of Congress, with measures that continue to change the paradigm, with the closure of productive industrial facilities, the dismantling of the state, staff suspensions, granting of holidays outside the corresponding period, "voluntary" withdrawals that have no impact on statistics, among others. Already in 2015, we had predicted that trade union work would support resistance to these changes, that the reform would not be done by Congress, but would take place in factories, workplaces. "

Zamboni said in this regard that "the project that did not take place in December 2017 is implemented where there is no power of workers, or where the unions are willing to do anything, as in the case of the collective labor agreement Download with Free Mercado (see separate) ".

The lost

"As we announced at the time, the change of governance model in Argentina has led to a paradigm shift in the world of work. We have predicted precariousness and this trend has been consolidated, as well as the exponential growth of inequalities, "said Caggiano. And he illustrated, for example, the decline in the power to purchase the minimum wage of 13% between March 2018 and 2019, the end of the wage agreements of the period 2018, the workers of real wages were strongly affected by the loss of the real wages of the footwear sector (17%), the textile industry (17%), the general government (14%) and "this trend was postponed to the first half of 2019 , the number of workers suspended in the private sector doubled, the purchasing power of wages contracted, affecting consumption and the level of activity, are the most severe since the exit of convertibility. However, no published statistics from this period are interesting if it is not measured in comparative terms with the content achieved since the release of convertibility, "he observed.

Last week, the Ministry of Production and Labor announced that 217,100 jobs had been removed from the labor register from May 2018 to the same month in 2019, which means that the destruction of jobs was far more important than creating jobs. work "Since he's lost, since we recover more. A greater reduction in labor law, there is less work: the opposite of the infamous TV propaganda to create new positions, "denounced Elizondo.

And he concluded: "If there is an instrument that allows you to shoot or facilitate it, and that it is used, this instrument destroys the work, do not believe it. Because if people are fired in times of crisis, it's not to replace another: it's a position that is lost, that society loses and that's what that they claim not to be understood, "he concluded.

In combat

This week, trade unions gave strong signs of resistance to labor reform, such as land, water and air transport, which successfully settled their disputes and were confederated to the Catt. To celebrate and demonstrate precisely against the flexibility and any claim of the government to modify the labor law, a big march of trucks, mainly of collectors, was organized Wednesday, on more than 30 blocks of extension. The tour took place along the Oroño Boulevard and ended at Tucumán Street, at the Sportivo América Club, where an event was held led by the President of the National Confederation, Juan Carlos Schmid.

In this context, the leader himself and the various union representatives composing the management committee of the new delegation of Rosario warned that they would mobilize against any attempt to reinstate the reform and against the project. Provincial adherence to the National Law on ART, which already has a half sanction of the Senate and that they consider as prejudicial to the right of workers to have "hindered" the possibility of pleading in case of accident of work, among other objections.

They denounce that the national standard, as it is sanctioned, is far from guaranteeing safety, does not provide for preventive measures and that it tends in any case to favor companies and risk insurers.

The cost of work and the job

The Observatory of Public Policies of the National University of Avellaneda (Undav) warned, in its latest report, "the fragility of the national economy" and the debate that the government establishes on the need to promote labor reform.

In this context, the work concludes that the empirical evidence "does not demonstrate or guarantee that a policy of flexibility and cost reduction for layoffs and labor disputes (one of the main demands of the labor market"). world of business and the IMF) generates more work and production. "

In fact, "the working conditions have already become precarious since December 2015," with no growth in employment, "they told Undav.For graphical representation, the institution said that By April of this year, the real wage of the formal private sector had decreased by 17.8% compared to October 2015 and by 13.5% compared to December 2017.

"However, far from recovering, employment in the sector fell by 2.5%. Some 158,000 jobs were destroyed in 16 months in the formal private sector despite the sharp drop in labor costs, "said the research firm, concluding:" empirical evidence show that unemployment rates, rising and falling, are correlated with economic cycles and not with more or less flexibility in the labor market ".

Finally, Undav warned that reducing compensation costs and labor disputes would aggravate the instability of the workforce and the economy, which is the weak link in the capital-labor relationship, breaking historic conquests of workers and trade unions.

In this sense, the labor lawyer Rosario Luciana Censi remarked that "whenever there were labor reforms, there was no reactivation of the internal market nor of work. Many of those that need to be implemented now have already been tested in our country in the 1990s in accordance with their prescriptions and, as we can see, this ended in 2001 and with the rate unemployment we all know.