Confesbask, CCOO and UGT completed the previous legislature with the agreement to sign labour agreements with an impact limited to the support of the Basque Government. The Basque unions denounced this as an unprecedented "anti-democratic path" and held a massive demonstration in Vitoria-Gasteiz five days before the CAV elections.

Well, this legislature will end in Lakua with the meeting of the so-called “Social Dialogue Bureau”, but without the presence of the trade union majority. You've read it well. A decree approved by the Governing Council on 15 January 2019 recognised this table as a “permanent body”, and now only one union needs to agree to approve the proposals that will be made. Again, the red lines of legitimacy in the trial.

In the photo of the last meeting, the representatives of CCOO and UGT, accompanied by Deputy Labour Advisor Jon Azkue, and the Director-General of Confesbask, sit at the table, keeping a distance of two meters between them. For ELA Secretary General Mitxel Lakuntza, this body is nothing more than a “carpet to hide the dirt of the Basque oasis”.

The Basque parties also accused Iñigo Urkullu of “going for photos” with the social agents’ crisis table set up to deal with covid-19, a table that was left soon.

Retreated pandemics

The pandemic has made it very clear what its side is. The efforts of the Economic Development Counselor, Arantxa Tapia, not to paralyze industrial activity, coincided fully with the will of Confebask, whose president, Eduardo Zubiaurre, explained in EiTB that it would be “a business suicide,” while many workers planted and prioritized health in factories.

The autonomous administration and the majority unions do not agree on how to deal with the coronavirus, or how to deal with the shock caused by the coronavirus. It is difficult to think that behind the motto “work, value and management” that Urkullu uses in this campaign are the same ideas as these unions.

LAB calls for an “eco-socialist and feminist transition” and advocates a radical change of the system. ELA has made a proposal for a “real exit” and considers it necessary to “create a social exit scenario that addresses the change of the economic and social model”. Both insist on the need to strengthen public services and dignify a precarious care sector.

Social mobilization, inevitably

The situation generated by the pandemic has also given rise to reflection. ELA believes that this type of crisis has been exploited by political and economic powers to “neutralise” social actors and approve adjustments on the pretext of the major pacts. In his view, social mobilization and social mobilization are essential if this is not to happen.

To a large extent, they began to break this path with the strike of 30 October, adding to the demands of pensioners, ecologists and the feminist movement. And here are the mass demonstrations that took place on 19 June in 45 localities of the Basque Country Social Rights Charter.

The Social Charter has held a round of contacts with the parties that have been presented to the elections to the Basque Parliament on 12 July. He has denounced that the PP and the PSE-EE have not wanted to meet and that, as far as the PNV is concerned, it has not done “any self-criticism” as the main party in the government. Thus, the unions and social agents who make up the letter have warned that they will be “aware of the risk of deepening the neoliberal policies that have been developed so far”.

Therefore, the government's policies after the 12J and the mobilizations from now on will show us how far the social gap between them is going to be. But one thing is clear: the distance of two meters will not be enough.