The meeting between the Government and UGT, the first after the general strike, was “very productive”, with the Executive showing “the desire to unblock negotiations”. This is how Mário Mourão, general secretary of the trade union central, summarized the meeting this Tuesday, December 16th.
At the end of the meeting lasting just over an hour and a half, Mário Mourão confessed to being “optimistic”, but assumed that “there is a lot of work to do” and that both parties will “continue to discuss article by article”. Assuring that UGT “will present proposals for changes to what it does not agree with”, Mário Mourão stated that, “during the next month”, some work will have to be done.
Although no meeting has been scheduled between the Government and the trade union central, both sides of the barricade will sit at the table at the Social Concertation meeting, scheduled for January 14th.
As Mário Mourão said at the end of the meeting, there was a “resumption” of work “that was interrupted” with the general strike. “Now we are back at the table. It was a very productive meeting, which brought back the confidence that is necessary in negotiations“, he assured.
Not wanting to lift the veil on possible rapprochements between the parties, the secretary general of the UGT reiterated that the meeting “was very constructive, but there is work to do”. Especially because, recalling the words he had said at the end of the last meeting, “there are still a lot of hard stones to break”. “That’s what we’re going to do,” he assured.
But was there a change of stance on the part of the Minister of Labor, Maria do Rosário Palma Ramalho? “No. What is there is, again, the desire to unblock the negotiation, because we understand that it was blocked.”
Speaking at the end of the meeting, the minister was in the same direction as UGT, speaking of a “very constructive meeting”. “We have defined the next steps, which include continuing to meet bilaterally and on January 14th holding a meeting at the Permanent Commission for Social Coordination, where the partners will bring their proposals”, he said.
Asked about a possible change in the Government’s stance, Maria do Rosário Palma Ramalho states that the attitude “is the same”, that of “total availability”. “Nothing has changed on the Government’s part”, he assured, admitting that “there will have to be a meeting halfway”.
Announcing that this Tuesday’s meeting did not serve to “discuss the content”, but to define the next steps, Maria do Rosário Palma Ramalho said she expected UGT “and the other Social Concertation partners” to present proposals by the January meeting.
Also not lifting the veil on possible setbacks in the labor package, the government official admitted that there is, on the part of the Executive, “availability to bring positions closer”. “The concrete measure of this rapprochement can only be determined in the Social Concertation meetings and that is why I cannot reveal the content here. The negotiations take place in the room”, he concluded.
Also this Tuesday, it was learned that the CGTP (which is excluded from these negotiations with the Minister of Labor) will be received on January 7th by the Prime Minister.