The UGT Public Services Federation has organized four informational assemblies aimed at staff in the field of dependency care, which will serve as a prelude to a protest concentration in front of the Parliament of Cantabria on September 21, coinciding with the start of the new session period, at 4:00 PM, to demand labor and salary improvements in the future regional collective agreement.
The meetings will be held at the union offices in Santander (September 8), Torrelavega (September 9), Reinosa (September 10), and Laredo (September 16), all starting at 5:00 PM.
In a statement, the Secretary of Dependency of UGT Public Services in Cantabria, Gema Fernández, detailed that these assemblies will explain the initiatives undertaken by the union since last March, including meetings with various employers' associations and different parliamentary groups, with the aim of "achieving improvements in labor and economic conditions and ensuring the future of this sector."
In particular, the union organization has presented to the parliamentary groups "the serious situation" currently faced by the dependency sector and the urgency of reforming the Law on Rights and Social Services of Cantabria to "support the future of a regional collective agreement."
"It is time to dignify the workers who sustain the dependency sector because, if the current labor and salary conditions are maintained, there will be no professionals left and the users will be neglected," emphasized the regional head of UGT in Dependency, a sector that employs just over 10,000 salaried workers (10,280), of which 85% are women (8,672).
The union representative stressed that the field of dependency "cannot continue to be sustained thanks to the vocation of its professionals as has been happening for years because when you are losing money by going to work, there is no vocation that can withstand it."
For this reason, UGT considers it "essential" that the political class "takes a step forward" and adapts the regulations to allow for the negotiation of the next regional agreement since, without that political and legal support, it believes that "it will be very difficult" to formally establish the negotiating table and "the sector will continue in a situation that borders on the tragic, both for the workers and for the users."