|
In the 1960s
and early 1970s, he was a member of the guerrilla
organization Movimiento de Liberación Nacional - Tupamaros (MLN).
He was imprisoned for 13 years in the Penal de Libertad, a
maximum-security prison that was almost like a concentration
camp. Since 2005, he heads the Ministry of Labor, and his
administration has received the highest levels of approval
from the population. Bonomi met with
Sirel in his
office at the old ministerial building, in the threshold of
the Ciudad Vieja district and near the port of Montevideo.
What follows is a summary of the extensive conversation we
had with him.
A unique minister
-What did you do before you were arrested? Were you a
student? Did you work?
-While I was still in high school I played professional
soccer in a team called Wanderers, one of the so-called
“small clubs” of the Uruguayan league. I continued playing
even after I started my university studies at the School of
Veterinary in 1969. I was thrown in jail in 1972, when I was
in my fourth year of University.
-Were you forced to go underground?
-I had to go partially underground between January and June
1972, when I went completely underground. That lasted a
month, because I was arrested on July 21st of
that year.
-Had you already formed your own family by then?
-I was married and had a son who at the time of my arrest
was barely a year and a few months old. We didn’t see each
other again for almost two years.
-Were you always in the Penal de Libertad prison?
-At first l was held for six months in the 13th
Infantry Battalion, and from there I was taken to Libertad.
In 1975 I was taken three times to the Department of
Colonia to be “interrogated,” and then returned to the
same prison were I was held until 1985.
-What did you do when you were released from prison?
-I worked in a fish processing plant from May 17, 1985 to
April 1999, when the company was shut down. I was general
secretary of the plant’s trade union, and co-founder of the
Uruguayan Congress of Fish Industry Workers (CUTIP),
an association that gathered the unions of all the fish
processing plants in the country. I was a member of the
Governing Committee and the Executive Secretariat of that
body. At the same time, I was on the Central Committee of
the MLN (National Liberation Movement), and in my
capacity as member of that committee I was co-founder of the
Popular Participation Movement (Movimiento de Participación
Popular - MPP), which is currently the majority
sector in Uruguay’s governing party, the Frente Amplio
Coalition (FA). From 2000 to 2005, I represented both
organizations in the Political Board of the FA. I
also have two daughters, from a second marriage, which are
currently 20 and 16 years old.
-Are you still a member of the MLN?
-I am on the MLN’s Central Committee and its
Executive Committee, and on the National Governing Board and
Executive Committee of the MPP. In the 2004 national
elections I was elected congressman, and 15 days after
taking office I was appointed Minister of Labor and Social
Security. Present at the inauguration ceremony were the
outgoing Minister, Santiago Pérez del Castillo, and
the Minister of Labor of the Republic of Argentina,
Carlos Tomada, with whom I have a relationship that
goes back several years. He chose to honor my appointment
with his presence.
The main ideas underpinning his administration
-What were the first decisions you made as Minister?
-I took office at 9 am and five minutes later I had signed a
resolution withdrawing the privilege that allowed Ministry
Directors to have an official car at their disposal 24 hours
a day and which they took home. The second resolution I
signed was a cooperation agreement between our Ministry and
the Argentinean Ministry.
-Can you confirm if it’s true that Uruguay currently has,
and has had for the past few years, the world’s highest rate
of unionization with respect to its population?
-I don’t have that data for the rest of the world. I can
tell you however that at the last Congress of the PIT-CNT
(the central workers’ federation), which was held some
months before the election, 109 thousand union members were
declared, and by now the federation has close to 250
thousand members, which means it grew approximately 150
percent. This information is already old, so it’s likely
that that figure is higher now. Unfortunately, I have no way
of comparing it to figures from other countries. But we must
point out that this membership is not even close to the rate
of unionization that existed in Uruguay before the
dictatorship, which was much higher.
-It is obvious that this growth is spurred by the policies
deployed by the new government through this Ministry. What
are the key ideas that you brought into your administration?
-We had very specific and well-defined ideas. Our Ministry
was perhaps the ministry with the clearest idea of where we
should begin working, as we had focused our strategy in four
or five essential measures:
·
Reinstating collective bargaining under the Uruguayan
modality, which consists of the Wage Councils governed by
the Law of 1943.
·
Incorporating rural and domestic workers into the Wage
Councils, something that had never been done before in the
history of Uruguay.
·
Radically modifying employment policies, because the
policies implemented as of 1991 were aimed more at providing
funds for unemployed workers than at generating jobs. Our
aim was to use unemployment funds to promote active
employment policies.
·
Another key step in our administration was to strengthen the
Labor Inspection Bureau.
·
We also sought to protect union activities by promoting the
adoption of a Trade Union Rights Act.
·
And a proposal for limiting the workday in agricultural
activities, for which we had already prepared a draft.
These were the key ideas that would underpin our
administration.
-What have you done to implement them?
-I took office on March 2, 2005, and on March 7 of that year
we convened the traditional Wage Councils and the rural
ones, and called all civil servants to a negotiation.
The Wage Councils
-What are the Wage Councils?
-The Wage Councils are a three-party model of collective
bargaining organized according to industrial sector. Each
Wage Council is formed by three representatives of the
Executive Branch of Government, two of management, and two
of the workers. These Councils decide on the minimum wage
for each category, and on wage increases, but they can also
discuss the categorization, and pursuant to the Law
(although this is not common practice) they can act as an
inspection body to control compliance with the agreements.
They can also operate as mediators in labor conflicts. The
Executive Branch appoints its representatives directly,
while the others are elected by secret vote. These Councils
were created in 1943, they were suspended in 1968, during a
period already marked by authoritarianism, and they were
reinstated in 1985 with the first presidency of Julio
María Sanguinetti, who issued a decree to modify the
original regulations, so that the representatives of
management and the workers were to be appointed directly by
the chambers and unions. This meant that Wage Council
resolutions could not be turned into law, and it was all
left to the discretion of the Executive Branch, who
sanctioned the resolutions through a decree that often left
out the demands of the workers.
But then they disappeared again…
-In 1991, Luis Alberto Lacalle’s government stopped
convening them, and in 2005 we enabled them again under the
scheme established by Sanguinetti, but now we’ve
presented a bill to Congress whereby a National Bargaining
System is created, connecting the establishment of a
national minimum salary by decree, with three-party
bargaining by industry sector under the Wage Councils and
two-party bargaining at the company level, where issues that
are not discussed in the Councils can be solved. This bill
modifies the 1943 Law, enabling both modes of appointing
representatives, that is, by election or by joint decision
of members, which would enable the body’s resolutions to be
turned directly into law. We’re still adjusting the details
on this point in the parliamentary discussion.
-How did the Wage Councils work?
-Twenty-one groups of traditional Wage Councils were formed,
which in 2005, including groups, subgroups, chapters and
folders, produced an initial 186 Collective Agreements. The
number of agreements totaled 213 in the second round of the
Councils. These last rounds included the three rural groups.
Outside of these forums, a bargaining space for employees of
the public sector was generated.
-What happened with the Labor Inspection Bureau?
-We were able to hire inspectors under exclusivity
contracts, adjusting their compensation accordingly so that
they can live on a single salary. They are currently paid a
little over 2 thousand dollars a month as base salary. We
were also able to hire 33 new inspectors and seven
professionals, including physicians, chemists, and
engineers, among others, that are now cooperating with the
work of the inspectors. We have not yet been able to acquire
4x4 vehicles that are essential to work in rural areas, but
we do have four 4x2 trucks that are a great help in terms of
transportation to rural worksites such as estancias, mines,
and forested fields.
With respect to employment policies, we’ve modified the
regulations so that, for example, unemployed workers can
choose to collect unemployment insurance in a single
payment, when they can prove their intent to invest in a
business that can be recovered by a cooperative or under any
other social economy scheme, thus enabling the preservation
of jobs. In addition, we’ve strengthened what we call the
Work Observatory, with the aim of permanently monitoring the
labor market and adapting the training structures available
to workers to focus on the most dynamic and fastest growing
sectors of activity. This may seem like the obvious thing to
do, but that’s not how it was being done. Until now,
training courses were opened randomly.
-Has any progress been made with respect to limiting the
length of the workday for rural workers?
-In the framework of the Wage Councils we presented a bill
that was approved by the workers and the Executive Branch
and which is now under discussion in Parliament. Another
objective was met in late 2005 with the approval in
Parliament of the Trade Union Rights Act. This means that of
all the objectives we had set for ourselves at the start of
this administration, the only one pending is the
establishment of the Wage Council for domestic workers. We
convened the Council, but there were no representatives of
the employers; there is, however, a workers union for the
sector, formed after 2005. Some time ago, I decided that
every time I was asked to participate in seminars,
colloquiums or events on gender equality, where this issue
is always present, I would appeal to the other participants
-who for the most part employ domestic help- to form an
employer counterpart for this Wage Council. Finally, the
League of Housekeepers, which was formed over 15 years ago,
came forward and applied for participation in the Wage
Council in representation of employers, so that we have
already summoned this Council for next May.
Pending issues:
the National System of Collective Bargaining
-What then are the next steps planned?
-Now it’s time to consolidate what we have done so far. In
that sense, we have several bills presented in Parliament,
such as, for example, the National System of Collective
Bargaining, which consists of two chapters: one that applies
to the private sector, and the other to the public sector.
The law for limiting the length of the workday for rural
workers also seeks to consolidate what has been accomplished
so far. And I was forgetting another very important law,
which has already been passed: the law on outsourcing.
-What does this law do?
-It does not prohibit outsourcing or subcontracting. Rather
it establishes that whoever employs workers hired by a
subcontractor is jointly and severally or secondarily liable
not only with respect to wage issues, as was already
established since 1943, but also with respect to Social
Security and Insurance Bank contributions and compliance
with regulations on health and safety at work. If the
original company makes sure that the subcontractor complies
with all the regulations, its responsibility is secondary
and any legal actions will be brought against the
subcontractor. Otherwise, it will be jointly and severally
liable and the worker may choose to bring legal action
against either company. The definition of this bill involved
a great deal of time, and the employer sector withdrew from
the discussion of regulations because they disagreed with
the synthesis we made. At the same time, it also withdrew
from the discussion on Collective Bargaining, so that this
bill was presented to Parliament without prior discussion,
and this gives rise to criticism from business and workers.
Our proposal was meant as a draft to be submitted for
discussion by all three parties, with the aim of presenting
a more polished version to parliament, even if we didn’t
reach a consensus among all the parties.
-It must be difficult to reach full consensus…
-It is. Because both employers and workers approach
bargaining with the attitude that “there is no agreement at
all until an understanding is reached on each and every
issue,” and this means that a stumble in any one issue can
topple all the previous achievements in other issues. For us
this is still useful, though, because if a consensus was
reached in 18 issues but not in two, for us it still means
we’ve made a lot of progress, even if the parties leave
negotiations saying that no agreement was reached. We are
left with insight on where we should direct our efforts. In
this case, the discussion was only with the workers. We hope
that in the parliamentary discussion the parties will
contribute their respective inputs, so that the legislators
can arrive at a more polished synthesis based on our draft.
-The employers’ sector reacted very strongly to this issue.
-They made very harsh statements. The Labor Legislation
Commission in Parliament unanimously decided to request the
assistance of the International Labor Organization (ILO).
This body’s Santiago de Chile Office is sending
within the next few days a three-party mission that will
participate in a debate involving employers, workers,
legislators and this Ministry, with the aim of contributing
input to provide legislators with a broad base for
subsequent discussion and reflection. This is happening
because employers have said that they will oppose this
regulation in the version we drafted, because they disagree
with our view of worksite occupations. In any case, now the
ILO will be involved right from the start of the
debate, and thus its recommendations will be received prior
to the legislative stage.
Occupation of worksites
-This issue of occupations, and the use of such measure in
Uruguay by trade unions, has been very controversial. What
is the Ministry’s view on this issue?
-In Uruguay occupations have never been criminally
penalized, and they’ve existed since the 1950s. From that
time on, every government -including those of the first
stage of the dictatorship that began in 1973- had to
negotiate with the occupying workers. No one ever prohibited
them. What’s more, the vast majority of academic writings on
labor law sees occupations as a form of exercising the right
to strike. Labor law experts who think otherwise are a very
small minority, so much so that when some opponents of our
proposal tried to present divergent opinions, instead of
drawing on academic experts they had to engage law firms.
Even the ILO considers that occupations are a part of
striking, and they advise against repressing workers that
engage in them, unless the occupations are not peaceful,
that is, if they are used as a way to exercise violence
against people or things. This recommendation is established
within the Committee on Freedom of Association, and as it is
not a formal resolution of the ILO, the employers’
sector maintains that it is not part of the body’s
Conventions and, therefore, refuses to acknowledge them as
legal. But in fact, the country’s practice has traditionally
been one of tolerance. Since the end of the dictatorship in
1985, there have been at least several dozen occupations,
and only three of them were repressed. For 20 years, the
parties that are now in the opposition had the necessary
legislative majorities to prohibit occupations, but they
never did so. There must be a reason for that. Now, however,
when they are a minority in Parliament they want us to do
what they chose not to. They are demanding that we regulate
strikes, something they also chose not to do. The argument
they use to criminalize occupations is that they violate the
right to work and the right to property. There are actually
several court judgments that establish that when workers
occupy a worksite without using the facilities for purposes
other than achieving their demands, and they then return
them intact to the owner, private property is not affected.
-There have also been many agreements with employers.
-There have been many. Management withdrew from the
discussion of the regulations, but not from the Wage
Councils, from a space created by this government, which is
known as the National Commitment for Employment, Income and
Responsibilities, where workers, management and government
seek agreements aimed at improving national production and
creating jobs. The withdrawal of management was based on
their discrepancy with two or three of the issues discussed.
We could even say that the vast majority of the companies
complied with the agreements reached in the Wage Councils.
The thing is that in 2006 there was a total of 23
occupations, and in 2007 there were 24, but the media
coverage of the occupation of factories and plants often
gets blown out of proportion, and the declarations tend to
be harsh and passionate, so what happens is that with all
that noise, the thousands of agreements that are honored go
unnoticed. Also, we understand that most of these conflicts
were generated because management failed to honor the
agreements signed. There are some conflicts caused by
intransigence in the demands, but they are a very small
fraction.
Towards self-regulation
-Summing up, there is a greater rate of unionization, a
general compliance with the agreements reached, collective
bargaining in the Wage Councils, a significant contribution
to national labor legislation, a strengthening of the Labor
Inspection Bureau, and along with this, a huge increase in
investment in the country, which means that this scenario is
not driving capital away. In international labor forums, the
“Uruguayan model” is already being highlighted as a
successful experience. What do you think of this?
-There are foreign investors that see Uruguay as
offering sufficient guarantees in labor aspects, and some
Uruguayan business operators that believe that such
guarantees don’t exist. That’s a fact, and it seems more
like it’s a matter of an inward-looking debate, where
complex and intricate interests are expressed. Moreover, all
labor relations are based on a combination of bargaining,
strikes and respect for union rights. We have instrumented
these principles through three focal points: centralized
collective bargaining, an inclusive policy, and the
promotion of self-regulation. Bargaining is conducted in a
tripartite structure, so that the State participates, in
addition to centralizing the work programs. This is
complemented with a union rights promotion policy, because
traditionally our society, or a large part of it, has
accepted the need to level inequalities between workers and
employers in order to achieve effective bargaining. It is
often claimed that negotiation must be conducted in a
two-party structure, and the North European countries are
presented as examples of this form of negotiation. But in
those countries, union dues go in part to the Social
Democratic Party, which is generally in power. Therefore,
the support and defense that unionized workers have there is
much greater than what we have generated here. The defense
of union freedom is not just a goal in itself, it is a way
of strengthening negotiations.
An inclusive policy. In three years and two rounds of Wage
Councils we have reached more than 400 Collective Bargaining
Agreements, of which approximately 380 were reached by
consensus. This model tends to include every activity and
every stakeholder.
With the promotion of self-regulation we want to point out
that conflict resolution can be achieved in two ways:
through hetero-resolution, that is when a judge is called to
act as arbitrator in finding a solution; and through
self-resolution, which is when the parties solve their own
conflicts. With all these instruments what we want is to
move increasingly towards self-regulation, with the State
participating less and less. But to reach this
self-regulation we need to attain a balance first, and
that’s what we’re working on.
In English legal writings, this is known as “conflictive
pluralism,” and it is based on the assumption that in a real
and genuine democracy, conflict is inevitable, because a
natural part of the workings of the system is the existence
of groups with diverse and conflicting interests. In that
sense, we shouldn’t deny the existence of conflicts, instead
we must seek to balance the forces in conflict and solve
their differences.
-Is that what this Ministry is trying to do in Uruguay?
-Yes. But we have to bear in mind that we come from 14 years
in which the opposite was done: years of promoting labor
deregulation and flexibilization. I don’t mean to say with
this that there shouldn’t be flexibility in the field of
company organization. That’s another thing altogether. What
I’m referring to is the dismantling of labor legislation,
which is what happened here. Under such conditions, calling
on the parties to negotiate among themselves would be
promoting the survival of the fittest, with the stronger
party prevailing over the weaker one, which is vulnerable in
terms of organizing capacity. Today, we do the opposite and
from the reaction we get you’d think the world was about to
end. But that’s not true. The level of unemployment stood at
more than 12 percent, and in December 2007 it went down to
7.7 percent, the lowest it has been in the history of
Uruguay; this is because employment went up. According
to an international consultancy company, in that year
Uruguay’s industry grew an overall 10 percent; the sector
that works for exports grew a little below that figure, and
the industry that produces for the domestic market and
competes with imports grew above the average, but the
industry geared towards the domestic market that doesn’t
compete with imports grew 15 percent. The explanation given
by the consultancy company for this scenario is that
employment grew, salaries and retirement pensions went up,
and there is more domestic consumption. Salaries, the income
of families, became the engine of internal development. The
manager and owner of large commercial spaces, accountant
Carlos Lecueder, recently said that the country
is very close to experiencing a consumption boom, and his
explanation for this is that employment has gone up, family
income has increased, and families are no longer afraid of
not being able to pay installments and so they’re consuming
more.
For my part, I’d like to add that internal tourism has gone
up 10 percent and the number of Uruguayans that have
traveled abroad on vacation is coming close to the level it
had seven years ago, prior to the 2002 crisis. These figures
are the result of a general policy implemented by the
government, which has the labor policy as one of its
components.
-Some believe that this government has a right-wing economic
policy and a left-wing labor policy.
-What it has is a government policy. There are some who
claim to agree with the economic policy but not with the
labor policy, and then there are others who say the
opposite, but they’re both wrong in their perception. This
government has a single policy that articulates different
complementary aspects.
-The ILO is conducting a pilot experience in Uruguay. Could
you tell us what it’s about?
-The ILO is implementing a decent work pilot project
in eight countries, of which Uruguay is the only
medium-income country. Our country was selected because,
according to the ILO’s criteria, it is one of
the countries that has advanced the most in this concept. We
have also had significant support from the ILO for
other programs and objectives.
 |
