Concentration of lawyers at the doors of the headquarters of the Ministry of Justice this Friday in Madrid Mercedes Ortuño Lizarán (EFE)
Lawyers for the Department of Justice and the ministry led by Pilar Llop are sticking to the pulse they started a month ago, but both parties concede the meeting they held this Friday could be a good place to start to start approaching positions. The meeting ended with no agreement, but with the delivery of a proposal from Justice, which the lawyers are ready to study in order to provide an answer next Monday, the day a new meeting was scheduled. “The positions are far apart and the negotiations have only just started,” said Luis Toribio, a member of the strike committee, which consists of the National College of Lawyers, the Progressive Union of Lawyers (UPSJ) and the Independent Association of Lawyers (Ainlaj). .
The former court clerks are demanding a “decent” salary from the government for the larger responsibilities they have taken on since the judicial offices began operating in 2015. Their demand implies an average increase of 600 euros (currently they are asking between 37,697 and 58,979, according to the ministry) to match 85% of what a judge is asking.
The judiciary promised to “promote” that pay rise in April last year, but the Treasury turned it down, and the lawyers, who had called for concrete strikes in recent years, this time launched an indefinite strike, marking a month this Friday and which has already forced the suspension of more than 200,000 court cases and views across Spain. The ministry announced this Friday that the minimum benefits agreed at the start of the strike will be increased in order to guarantee the payment of child benefit pensions and civil marriages in the registry office.
More information
This Friday’s meeting was the second after Thursday last week, when they held a meeting that lasted 15 hours, some of which passed in complete silence, with both parties sitting around the table. Judicial sources and the strikers agree today’s was in a more “constructive” tone. On behalf of the Ministry, the representation was headed by the Secretary General for Innovation and Quality of the Public Justice Service, Manuel Olmedo, who handed them a document with various proposals, which, while not including the general salary increase, which they request lawyers, includes, according to sources , who are familiar with it, a salary supplement for attorneys assigned to smaller communities whose salaries are lower than that of their fellow colleagues, and other job improvements.
The judiciary is demanding they call off the strike to continue negotiations, but the lawyers have refused because, they say, the ministry’s document shows how “distant” the positions of both parties are. However, the strikers are confident that Friday’s meeting will mark the “beginning of a dialogue” that may lead to a resolution of the conflict. “We have to study the proposal, we are committed to doing that,” said Juan José Yáñez, a member of the strike committee.
What affects most is what happens closer. Subscribe so you don’t miss anything.
subscribe to
The department headed by Llop warns that the raise demanded by the lawyers will not be granted as the Treasury Department has already vetoed it. The judiciary recognizes that an additional provision of the General Budget Law of 2021 provided for the “salary adjustment” requested by that body, but that this obligation has already been met through an agreement with the unions that implied an increase of 206 euros per month for lawyers. “It’s one of the bodies that has had the highest pay rise this term,” the justice chief said in a speech in Congress last week.