Ismael Bermúdez
07/22/2020 - 10:41
- Clarín.com
- Economy
- Economy
Despite double compensation and the prohibition of layoffs, in April the Ministry of Labor recorded 5,804.7 billion registered employees in the private sector , 216,300 fewer than in December of the previous year. Of this total, the largest drop, with 70,800 fewer employees, corresponds to formal construction workers.
The Construction Labor Report highlights an annual decline in employment of 28.3% : having registered 454,100 formal workers in April 2019, it fell a year later to 323,800.
Clarín was told by the Ministry of Labor that the DNU that doubled the severance pay does not apply to construction because workers in the sector have no compensation. There is a “cessation fund” that employees withdraw when they stop working according to the amount they have accumulated. Meanwhile, the DNU that prohibits layoffs does apply to construction workers, but in the labor portfolio they admitted that "there is a legal controversy that must be resolved by justice."
The Construction Work Cessation Fund replaces the notice and dismissal regime of the Labor Contract Law. The Fund is financed with a contribution the first year of the employment relationship equivalent to 12% of the monthly remuneration and 8% from the second year on the employer's charge. And with the termination of employment, the worker takes the accumulated funds, without receiving any notice or compensation.
In the UOCRA they maintain that the DNU that prohibits the dismissals did not exclude any sector because it is valid for the unions that are governed by special regimes, such as construction.
The lawyer Luis Ramirez told this newspaper that "the so-called double compensation reaches only dismissals without just cause , which raised doubts regarding its application in the construction industry, which has a special statute in which there is no compensation for dismissal without just cause, but an unemployment fund that is given to the worker at the end of the employment relationship, whatever the cause. With DNU 329/2020, extended by DNU 487/2020, it is reiterated that the prohibition reaches dismissals without just cause, which does not allow to clear the doubt about its application or not to construction workers. The jurisprudence that exists to date refers to requests for reinstatement and precautionary measures, which is logical attentive judicial times.
For labor lawyer Nicolás Schick, construction workers have the Work Termination Fund “for what the DNU considers, in an erroneous and discriminatory way, that the fund withdrawal amounts would be sufficient to subsist without having the economic protection of the doubling of severance pay. Meanwhile, regarding layoffs, DNU 329/2020 does not distinguish between the different regimes applicable to workers and their different modes of stability. Consequently, the prohibition of dismissals governs because the DNU and the principles of the Labor Contract Law prevail. ”
Meanwhile, with the prohibition of dismissals, the court approved several precautionary measures (Córdoba, Mendoza, Río Negro) based on DNU 329/2020 declaring "the nullity of the termination of the employment relationship provided by the construction company" and ordering " the reinstatement of the worker to his tasks and under the conditions that were provided. "
AQ