Prime minister Luís Montenegro has warned today that the country will not get out of its rut if it does not move forward now with changes to labour legislation – taking advantage of the ‘good condition’ he believes it is currently experiencing.
“We have to take advantage now that we are in good shape. It is not when we are in a crisis situation that we are going to change the structures of our economy to make it more productive and profitable,” he said, suggesting Portugal has “a number of significant opportunities” ahead (if it would only make the most of them).
The prime minister was speaking to an audience of businesspeople at the opening of Millennium Portugal Exportador, which is taking place at Europarque, in Santa Maria da Feira, in the district of Aveiro.
In other words, he was ‘preaching to the converted’ – not to the unions (or parties of the left-wing opposition) that are so wary of his government’s intentions.
Mr Montenegro said that the government is acting within a ‘triangle of intervention’, which combines taxation, the fight against bureaucracy and flexible labour legislation, and which should produce “an even more virtuous effect on the economy, on the life of companies and on the life of the financial system” (if only it was allowed to go ahead).
“If we don’t do this, we won’t get out of the rut. And we don’t want a Portugal stuck in a rut. We want a thriving Portugal. We want a Portugal with a cycle of economic strength, lasting strength, a cycle that keeps people here and makes companies competitive so they can win and retain their markets,” he said.
Mr Montenegro also said that he wants ‘lower taxes, greater simplification, less complexity’ and more flexible labour legislation to ‘maximise the company’s capacity’, arguing that workers need to contribute so that their more flexible relationship with their employer is a stimulus for “greater productivity and profitability, and wages can grow”.
“We don’t want projects blocked in their growth, we don’t want low wages, we don’t want everyone to be on the minimum wage threshold. On the contrary, we want people to be able to aspire to earn more, to grow, and for that we need an economy that doubles what is currently growing, from 2% to 3% and then from 3% to 3.5% and from 3.5% to 4%.”
Also for that the government will need the support of the unions, which at the moment are preparing to bring Portugal to a standstill on Thursday December 11.
Source: LUSA
