trade unions

Final meeting of official consultation period on closure and redundancies underway

Union heads vow not to pay for impending financial crisis

Spanish government, trade unions, and employers' associations agree on raise

New date expected to more closely coincide with announcement of 2017 referendum case verdict and other protests in support of jailed leaders

Barcelona's Zona Franca plant "is ready" to produce electric vehicles, says CCOO trade union head

Workers' representatives demand vehicle manufacturer pledge no further layoffs until 2022 and a larger pay rise than that offered by the firm

Women earn 24% less than men for the same job, says study

Medical staff strike partly called off as Catalan president says rallies are "fair, necessary and appropriate"

The Spanish Ministry of Education has filed an appeal to the Supreme Court of Catalonia (TSJC) to cancel the already-sent enrolment applications for the next school year in order to include the option of choosing Spanish as the language of tuition. Five parties representing 80% of the Catalan Parliament have strongly protested against this "new attack" on a school model that guarantees that pupils master both Spanish and Catalan and has many flexibility measures for newcomers. The model is also backed by an extremely broad majority of Catalan society and only a few dozen families, out of the 1.55 million pupils in Catalonia, had requested education in Spanish. Linguistic immersion in Catalan ensures knowledge of the language by children who are not regularly exposed to it, while the model also ensures knowledge of Spanish. Therefore, equal opportunities and complete bilingualism are ensured. However, the model has been the target of Spanish nationalists for a long time.

In times of shrinking public funding, higher tuition fees and fewer scholarships, a controversial new university reform has been approved by the Spanish Government. The so-called "flexibilisation" of Bachelor's degrees or the "3+2" system has been introduced, provoking a wave of protests and criticism across the university community. The new reform allows universities to choose an undergraduate programme length that ranges from 3 to 4 years, abandoning the 4-year scheme adopted in 2010. Then, a one- or two-year Master's will follow. Many fear that it will devaluate undergraduate degrees, obliging students to undertake a Master’s in order to find a decent job. Moreover, as postgraduate tuition fees are substantially higher, some think that the overall price of education is likely to rise, pushing the Spanish university system towards the US model. Other arguments against the reform are: the lack of democratic discussion on the new text, the temporal proximity of the previous reform and the potential increase in disorder within the system.

The Catalan Green Socialist and post-Communist coalition ICV-EUiA has presented the manifesto 'Catalonia with Tsipras' supporting Syriza, the Alternative Left Party that according to the polls could win the upcoming Greek General Election. More than 2,500 people have already signed the document through Change.org. The manifesto states that a clear win for the Alexis Tsipras party would be best for Europeans, in order to "initiate a necessary rebellion" in Southern Europe. The leaders of the main Catalan trade unions and some actors, writers and academics have expressed their support for the text. Barcelona will host a meeting focused on these elections on the 24^th of January.  

The President of the Catalan Government, Artur Mas, announced on Wednesday that next Monday he will send a letter to the Spanish Prime Minister, Mariano Rajoy, to assess November 9's participatory process and to offer a negotiation for organising a definitive referendum on independence. Mas made such an announcement the day after the Constitutional Court suspended November 9's vote and after the Catalan Government confirmed that the participatory process will still take place on Sunday. The Catalan President emphasised that November 9's vote "is not a referendum to declare independence" and he said that those making these declarations "are lying". Mas emphasised he has respected the suspension of the original consultation vote, launching a citizen participation process instead. "If such a process cannot be carried out in a normal way, then Spanish citizens should think about Spain's democratic quality", he concluded.

FC Barcelona has joined Catalonia’s National Alliance for Self-Determination, which groups together more than 3,000 organisations, such as chambers of commerce, employers’ associations, trade unions, political parties, NGOs, etc. The world famous sports club therefore backs Catalonia’s self-determination process and will participate in this group that works to push it forward. Furthermore, in the last few weeks leading Catalan sportsmen such as Xavi Hernández, Gerard Piqué, Pep Guardiola, Cesc Fàbregas, Pau Gasol, Marc Gasol, Aleix Espargaró and Pol Espargaró have given their explicit support to Catalonia’s right to hold a self-determination vote to decide on its own political future, regardless of whether they would vote for independence or not. In fact, only Guardiola has openly backed independence, although none of the others have specified being against it.