Yesterday the Government gave several keys to bring closer the final approval of the decree of urgent measures on the public pension system that will see the light in the Council of Ministers this Thursday. It will be validated by the parliamentary groups and members of the coalition and as a project to receive contributions from the parties.
The Minister of Social Security, José Luis Escrivá, settled the social dialogue table after obtaining the support of the UGT and CC.OO unions. to this second round of measures after having agreed at the last moment to increase the minimum retirement pension to 1.200 euros within four years, until reaching 60% of the median income of a household with two cohabitants, an amount that sets the INE Living Conditions Survey.
Having tied up the agreement with the unions, Minister Escrivá presented the signing of the agreement with the general secretaries of the union centrals, Pepe Álvarez and Unai Sordo, later presented the package of closed measures in the Toledo Pact. In this commission the Government announced that the norm will pass the parliamentary procedure and also received strong criticism for the roller applied during the negotiation process, also from the groups that will support the text in Congress,
Minister Escrivá's lengthy exposition on the impact of the measures that will be approved in the next few hours was not enough to satisfy the doubts and criticisms of the opposition parties, but also of the same groups that will presumably allow the law to be approved. "We are not going to allow Spain to stop receiving European funds," said Ana Oramas, deputy of the Canary Islands Coalition during her intervention, in which she, however, harshly criticized the Executive's actions.
"He does not believe in political consensus," said Vox parliamentarian Pablo Sáez along these lines, who assured that he will propose a reform agreement to a commission aimed precisely at equating the means of sober action to the public pension system "is a total irresponsibility". He stressed that, in addition to stealing the debate from the groups, applying measures that will hit the labor market by leading to an increase in employment costs.
As ABC published, given the impossibility of agreeing on the second package of measures at the social dialogue table with employers and unions, the Government went to Brussels to try to modulate the offer. The issue is that neither the employers nor the unions recognize among the recommendations of the Pact of Toledo or the extension of the computation term for the calculation of the pension, nor the destop of the maximum bases.
And that is why on this premise the Government has not considered calling the parties to modulate the proposal on the mandate of the Pact of Toledo. "They have not sent us the decree or the drafts," parliamentary sources told this newspaper. He assured that the sober documentation of the content and impact of the reform are the printed slides that they received minutes before the start of the commission.
At this point, the main opposition party, the PP, affirmed that it will reject the approval of this part of the pension reform for this very reason of having ignored the debate with the groups, even more serious if possible with the main party of the opposition. "It is a shame that you have not appeared in this Commission for eight months," said the PP deputy, Tomás Cabezón, about the calendar of the reform. He also put on the table, apart from the unilateral procedure of the Executive towards the parties, the inappropriateness of the planetary model, which, he has been able to judge, raise labor costs in a context of economic slowdown.
Transition time
Regarding the agreed fringe for the increase in the minimum pension, the decree to which ABC has had access establishes that by 2024 the existing gap must be reduced by 20%, by 2025 it will reduce the gap by 30%, for 2026 the expected reduction is 50%, while in January 2027 the reference amount will increase additionally, "until reaching the poverty threshold calculated for a household of two adults".
It should be noted that in order to establish a path for increasing the minimum pension, it was observed what its current value is and what is the gap with the objective of 1.200 euros.
