CELESTINO CORBACHO, Employment Minister

(The aim is) to be able to commit ourselves to raising 20 million people above the poverty line between now and 2020. I hope there will be a broad consensus and that the next Council will approve this goal in the 2020 Strategy.

LABOUR MARKET REFORMS

As long as the social dialogue round table continues and as long as there are meetings such as the meeting on Wednesday, it is clear that we are working with this aim in mind, but also with the clear idea that if there is no agreement on Wednesday then we will carry over the matter of reforms to the 16th and from then move on to the parliamentary route. And let us hope that we also have broad backing in Parliament.

The reforms will include many things and among them, beyond making it cheaper to lay people off, we will aim to settle on a way of making fixed-term contracts more attractive, such that the worker does not lose the right to severance pay with a 33-day contract; but at the same time the aim is that with this contract when dismissal occurs it costs the employer less.

Free dismissal already exists in Spain at the moment. This means that an employer can dismiss any worker from one day to the next simply by paying them 45 days severance pay. Therefore, on the contrary, at the moment what we are doing is looking for a way of opting for more stability in the workplace. I want to remind the unions, as they know, that at the moment in Spain we have 7 million workers with precarious contracts; and it would not be a matter of harming the rights of workers who already have a contract, but rather of giving those 7 million the opportunity of being offered a contract which is no longer precarious, but rather more stable.