By majority, the Legislature endorsed on Tuesday afternoon a proposal that claims that trade unionists cannot collect wages from the first day they are on strike and their payment should only proceed if a judicial authority demonstrates that the movement was due to serious breaches by the employer.
More than 29 legislators voted in favor and 22 against the initiative promoted by legislator Pedro Muñoz, from the Christian Social Unity Party (PUSC), who raised it as a motion to the bill to regulate strike abuses discussed in the Plenary.
According to the proposal, if the strike was declared legal by the courts and it was determined, in the same resolution, that the reasons for the strike were for serious offenses attributable to the employer, they will be condemned to pay wages corresponding to the days in which the workers went on strike.
The Social Christian explained that the approach is based on articles that already exist in the Labor Code, the Labor Procedural Law and standards of the International Labor Organization (ILO).
He insisted that his proposal is fair because whoever does not work should not receive a salary.
But legislators like Paola Vega, from the Citizen Action Party (PAC), Paola Valladares, from the National Liberation Party (PLN), Shirley Díaz, from the PUSC, and José María Villalta, from Frente Amplio (FA), questioned the proposal.
Vega and Valladares said the initiative “coerces” the workers, while Diaz commented that it goes against the principles established by former president Rafael Calderón Guardia y Villalta.