"European governments are being more courageous to accelerate the recovery"

• CÉSAR URRUTIA

Updated on Sunday, 28February2021-01: 41

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• Labor The Government qualifies the labor reform and Labor delays the repeal of the dismissal for justified leave

• Economy The Government offers to negotiate "soon" the repeal of the labor reform to demobilize the unions

Fátima Báñez has been president of the CEOE Foundation since last July, an organization from which

Antonio Garamendi

, the president of the employer's association, wants to promote the most social profile of companies.

Báñez, away from her responsibilities as Minister of Labor in the successive governments of Mariano Rajoy since 2018, sees from her new position in the private sphere a more intense crisis than the one she had to manage since the end of 2011. “The economy has suffered the greatest setback since the war in Cuba, but the social consequences will be more serious than the economic ones, "he warns.

Despite his retirement, Báñez is very present in the hectic world of labor relations.

With four million unemployed and 40% youth unemployment, his successor,

Yolanda Díaz

, does not withdraw from its commitment to dismantle the labor reform, the regulation launched by the Government of

Mariano Rajoy

.

Báñez advises "not to touch what works" and regarding the situation of his party and the political polarization he advises more center.

"Spain is moderate," he says.

After seven years as minister, she now chairs the CEOE Foundation.

What plans does he have at the head of this organization? The Foundation works through projects so that no one is left behind.

It does social work and also in anticipation of the transformations we are experiencing, so that we are able to move towards the new digital economy, towards sustainability and also the new challenges that we all have as a society. And what projects has it launched? the emergency, we launched Companies that help.

It channeled the social action of all types of Spanish companies, regardless of their size, which they wanted to join for Spain.

We have attended to the needs of food, masks, hydroalcoholic gels, connectivity, tablets, computers ... we do so because we are very aware that although there is a lot of good will on the part of the different governments, in the attention of a crisis like this one is needed to civil society to reach the last corner.

Also in health? It is essential to find that balance point between protecting people's health and also saving the economy and the jobs that are our way of life.

There we launched the Sumamos Plan.

What we are trying to do is that the disease does not spread further, because workers and companies are 40% on average of all citizens of Spain.

We help with recurring tests and positive tracking.

In Castilla y León and Madrid we have already helped this control grow by 30%.

When the vaccination schedule reaches companies and their workers, because there we also want to make all this capacity available to public health and health authorities in companies with more than 250 workers and with the capillarity of almost 1,000 centers and 10,000 professionals from mutual insurance companies throughout Spain. Do you see the goal of vaccinating 70% of the population for the summer being reached? The Government is working on that horizon.

Here are two determining themes.

The first thing is the arrival of vaccines, which is not a national decision.

And that the companies fulfill the commitments.

And secondly, the vaccination capacity that we have available, right?

If we add all the public power to the business world and from private health, we will be able to vaccinate many people in the shortest possible time, which is what it is about, because the less time we give the virus to mutate, the better. strongest of the crisis? We are going to get out of the crisis.

And how we do it until then will depend on the collateral effects that it entails.What do you mean? What this health crisis has changed to the economy and especially to employment.

The economic impact is an 11% drop in GDP, which is the largest since the war in Cuba in our country.

But more serious is the social impact.

We have four million unemployed people, 900,000, almost a million more in ERTE and 350,000 thousand self-employed persons in cessation of activity.

In other words, we are talking about almost 5.2 million people who want to work and who cannot do it right now.

A response must be given to that from unity and from everyone's commitment. How should the recovery be approached? Recovery will come sooner and if it supports those who create wealth and create jobs in Spain, which are companies.

At the beginning of the pandemic, administrative decisions affected the economy with a supply and demand shock that broke essential sectors.

Liquidity was needed for those companies that had to stop their activity by administrative decision.

But now we are facing a solvency problem;

There are many companies that have been closed for a long time and entire sectors to which mobility restrictions, both national and international, have made their company and business go bankrupt, bankrupt in the sense of interrupting, I say.

It is time for measures that have more to do with direct aid, with the restructuring of debts of those companies that have more problems and of course, continue with those policies that lead us to economic growth. Are you talking about aid or compensation ? The origin of the crisis is not financial as in 2008, it is health.

And to combat this crisis, certain administrative decisions are made at the European level and at the Spanish level.

And that makes the activity of the company and the day of the day, the day to day of the companies change.

Faced with this element of difference, the Government has the obligation to respond to save jobs and to save companies.

The crisis has wiped out 107,000 companies in the last year. More protection. Well, not only the Government of Spain is doing it, but all the governments of the world are doing it.

And in the case of those who are closest to us, which are Europeans, they are doing it even more decisively.

They have been more courageous so that the recovery is much faster and so that having the lowest cost in terms of unemployment, in social terms, is possible.

There is Germany with direct aid to the companies most affected by administrative decisions;

Italy with fiscal measures;

Portugal ... It's obvious.

Spain is doing what it should do to help the productive fabric.

Furthermore, I believe that we must be brave in that sense and I think that is why the Governor of the Bank of Spain has rightly said that we are in time to give a courageous response that will have effects to achieve recovery as soon as possible. defends that resources are allocated only to viable companies.

I simply say that this is the way, that we continue to maintain a productive fabric, which is the best way to maintain employment. There is also talk of maintaining the ERTE permanently. When the Government declared the pandemic as an element of force majeure, it had I've even done the ERTE.

The modifications that the Government of Mariano Rajoy made with the labor reform in 2012 have been very useful, because thanks to the flexibility that it gave to the ERTE by eliminating the prior administrative authorization, jobs have been saved.

In the previous crisis, with a fall of 3.8% in GDP, job destruction was 5.8%.

Now with a drop of 11%, job losses have been four times less.

Labor flexibility is the best way to maintain employment, as advocated by the European Commission, the International Monetary Fund, the OECD or the European Central Bank. Excuse me, but the Government assures that the ERTEs are the differential element in its management of the crisis.

Contract suspensions have existed before democracy and in 2012 we removed the need for prior administrative authorization.

The important thing is that it is an element that works.

And I am also very happy, if you will allow me, because I believe that is the best way to consolidate such an important reform. What do you think when you see that a part of the Government is committed to dismantling the labor reform, but the commitment does not translate into acts?

I have a lot of respect for the people who are currently governing in Spain, as well as for the social partners, who are key in the transition to recovery.

And I respect the decisions that are made.

If you look at the data and how the reforms have responded, there you see the answer.

It doesn't need much explanation either.

We must respond to the new realities that society lives, that the company lives, that the workers live.

And it's about change for the better.

They always taught me that when things work, you don't have to change them. Spain leads unemployment in the EU. Is unemployment a structural element of our economy?

Employability reached 62% in 2008. We must work with the ambition of full employment because it is the best social policy and it is also the greatest tool in the fight against inequality.

But for that we have to grow, we have to support companies, which are the ones that create jobs.

There we risk everything, we risk our national wealth and we also risk our welfare model.

Because nine out of every 10 euros that are paid every month in pensions are paid with employment.

Training in this sense is key: for every two jobs that are lost in the real economy today, five will be born in the transformation towards economy 4.0.

Well, let's go for those five. Is it really practical to separate two closely linked ministries as Labor and Social Security in the current emergency circumstances in the labor market? That depends on the presidents of government and the governments that make decisions in these moments.

It is not my role to comment on the new government structure.

I believe that coordination, in any case, must exist between the ministries and even more so where the responsibility lies.

The decisions of the Government are not the decisions of a minister, they are collegiate and, in the end, of all.

What Spanish society wants is for agreements to be reached, at a time when good coordination is needed. But the debate is very polarized. I am at the CEOE Foundation, I have been in politics and I am very proud to have been part of the team that with President Rajoy left a better Spain than it was found.

And I have always understood politics as life between positive and constructive.

And then adding efforts, adding wills, because we always go much further.

The great transformations, the great advances of this country have occurred since the meeting and from moderation.

I believe that this is what we all aspire to as a society and that also, the great parties of this country have demonstrated this throughout its history, for which there is no reason why it cannot pass this moment.

It is the experience that I have had: I believe that the one who governs has greater responsibility because he governs and the one who is in the opposition, because generosity is also expected.

So I'm sure that permanent dialogue always bears fruit and stays in the center.

Does the center remain small for the large parties? Spanish society is moderate and also advances when, from generosity, it works on those points where it coincides and we have done well throughout democratic history.

I had to live an experience in 2011. The second phase of a very hard crisis, which began in 2008 and the one that was at the forefront of recovery every day, which was Spanish society, the family, the workers , pensioners and companies. How do you understand the decision of your party, the Popular Party to leave its headquarters to start a new stage? Beyond symbols, the important thing about political parties are people, teams and projects .

The Popular Party has been, is and will be a very important party for I believe that the Popular Party has been, is and will be a very important party in the progress and well-being of Spain. Did you like the venue?

Some of his colleagues have said noI insist, the important thing is the people.

Institutions are enriched by people every day.

That is the key.

The key is to always put people at the center, beyond symbols.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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