BE Demands Urgent Hearing with Labor Secretary on Unemployment Benefit Changes

The Left Bloc wants to urgently hear the Minister of Labour, Solidarity and Social Security in the Assembly of the Republic about the changes the government wants to make to unemployment benefits.

In a request addressed to the chairman of the parliamentary committee on labor, social security and inclusion, Eurico Brillante Dias, the blockers ask for an urgent hearing of Minister Maria do Rosario Palma Ramalho to discuss what they say are the government’s “contradictory” positions in recent days regarding the issue of social support for the unemployed. .

The blockers criticize, in addition to contradictions within the government, the position of the executive branch that jeopardizes the protection of the “unemployed”, which they claim has been taken in recent days by the Minister of Labor and the Prime Minister.

“It is important to clarify the statements made by the Minister of Labour, Solidarity and Social Security, as well as those subsequently made by the Prime Minister, because they are contradictory, but also because they lead to an even greater lack of protection for people who find themselves in a situation of unemployment,” Bloco de Esquerda said in a statement.

BE refers to the statements of Maria do Rosário Palma Ramalho that “in Portugal there cannot be people who earn more through unemployment benefits than if they were working” and that it is necessary “to avoid that in Portugal there could be situations in which those who are not working actually have an income provided by the State that encourages them to remain as they are, rather than actively seeking work and working.”

In turn, the Prime Minister, during the two-week debate, said that the words of the Minister of Labor did not mean “devaluation of unemployment benefits”, but rather concern about “a set of other benefits” such as social unemployment benefits.

In this request, the Left Bloc also recalls that the Portuguese Confederation of Commerce and Services, after a meeting with the Minister of Labour, said that social consultations are discussing the application of “more effective criteria in terms of what is considered convenient employment”.

“These statements, made by the Prime Minister and the Minister of Labour, Solidarity and Social Security with the support of the Portuguese Confederation of Trade and Services, contradict each other,” criticize the blockers.

“If in one case we are talking about an insurance benefit in which workers deduct a percentage from their salary so that they are subsequently guaranteed a social right to which they have contributed, then in the case of a social unemployment benefit we are talking about a benefit that does not provide insurance premiums, which averages 397 euros,” they add.

For the party, “whatever the changes are, they will mean profound changes” in the current rules, “especially regarding the concept of convenient employment and the possibility of combining income from work with social benefits.”