The general secretary of UGT, Pepe Álvarez, has predicted that Catalonia will be among the regions with higher unemployment in the general strike this Wednesday. "If there is a community in which there is a conviction that this has to be done, it is the Catalan community," he said.
Álvarez made these remarks this Monday in Barcelona, before the media, accompanied by the general secretary of UGT in Catalonia, Camil Ros. He acknowledged that the union does not yet have a specific figure on participation, but he stressed that there is an "overwhelming social consensus" around the reasons for the call.
The union leader said that around 72% of the population believes there are sufficient reasons to call a strike in Spain. However, he warned that that support will be reflected "a little less" in actual participation, due to many workers' fear of possible retaliation or loss of wages.
With a view to the strike day, UGT will launch a specific website so that employees can report violations of their labor rights by companies. The union will make public the names of the companies singled out and, if the worker authorizes it, will forward the complaints to the Labor Inspectorate.
Housing decrees and effects of the strike
In relation to the vote on the housing-law decrees that will be debated in the Permanent Standing Committee of the Congress on November 12, one day after the strike, Álvarez pointed out that it will be "possibly the first victory."
He emphasized that the discussion about housing policy "has just begun" and that "whoever wins, they will address it," highlighting that, without the mobilizations of the past few weeks and the call for a general strike, that debate would not have gained the same force.
"They will do it because the majority of citizens has put it on the table, and those who are now launching criticisms will stop doing it on the 12th because there is a very large majority of citizens who has accompanied us," he added.
Reasons for the strike and social demands
Álvarez has framed the general strike in a juncture in which, despite wage improvements in collective agreements and the increase in the Minimum Interprofessional Wage (SMI), many families still cannot make ends meet. He has denounced that "there is no collective agreement that can withstand the rise in housing, but there is also no agreement that can withstand the problems that exist with public services."
He has stressed that the protest is aimed at "all public administrations" and has demanded new wage increases, as well as a major State pact on housing that would make it possible to freeze and regulate rental prices, limit the actions of investment funds, and address the impact of tourist rentals.
Likewise, he has urged the central Government, the autonomous communities, and town councils to commit to earmark, as a minimum, 1% of GDP over the next 10 years for the construction of protected housing.
Response to the criticisms of Ayuso
Regarding the words of the president of the Community of Madrid, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, who described UGT and CC.OO. as a "union mafia," Álvarez has replied that "Ms. Ayuso is not in a position to give lessons, neither about mafia nor about anything."
He has demanded respect for trade union organizations that, he has recalled, in territories such as Madrid and Catalonia have the backing of the overwhelming majority of workers in trade union elections, and he has warned that, by discrediting them, he is also showing disrespect to those employees who choose them at the ballot box.