Concentration of lawyers at the doors of the headquarters of the Ministry of Justice this Friday in Madrid. Mercedes Ortuño Lizarán (EFE)
The lawyers of the administration of justice and the ministry directed by Pilar Llop maintain the pulse that they began a month ago, but both parties admit that the meeting they held this Friday could be a good starting point to begin to approach positions.
The meeting ended without an agreement, but with the delivery of a proposal by Justice that the lawyers are willing to study to give an answer next Monday, the day for which a new meeting has been set.
"The positions are distant and the negotiation has only just begun," Luis Toribio, a member of the strike committee, made up of the National College of Lawyers, the Progressive Union of Lawyers (UPSJ) and the Independent Association of Lawyers (Ainlaj).
The former court clerks demand that the Government "adequate" salary to the greater responsibilities they assume since the judicial offices began operating in 2015.
Their claim implies an average increase of 600 euros (currently they charge between 37,697 and 58,979, according to data from the ministry), to stand at 85% of what a judge charges.
Justice promised to "promote" this salary increase in April last year, but the Treasury rejected it and the lawyers, who in recent years had been calling specific strikes, this time launched an indefinite strike that this Friday marks one month and that has already forced the suspension of more than 200,000 trials and views throughout Spain.
The ministry has reported this Friday that the minimum services agreed at the start of the strike will be increased to guarantee the payment of child support pensions and the celebration of civil weddings in the Civil Registry.
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This Friday's meeting was the second after Thursday of last week they held a meeting that lasted for 15 hours, several of which passed in absolute silence with both parties sitting around the table.
Today's, Justice sources and the strikers agree, has been 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 has handed them a document with various proposals, which, although they do not include the general salary increase that they demand lawyers, does include, according to sources familiar with it, a salary supplement for lawyers assigned to smaller municipalities, whose salary is lower than that of the rest of their colleagues,
Justice demands that they call off the strike to continue negotiating, but the lawyers have refused because, they say, the ministry document shows how "remote" the positions of both parties are.
However, the strikers have been confident that this Friday's meeting will mark the "beginning of a dialogue" that can lead to resolving the conflict.
"We have to study the proposal, we have committed ourselves," said Juan José Yáñez, a member of the strike committee.
The department directed by Llop warns that the salary increase demanded by the lawyers is not going to be granted because the Treasury has already vetoed it.
Justice admits that an additional provision of the General Budget Law of 2021 provided for the "salary adjustment" requested by this body, but that this commitment has already been fulfilled through an agreement with the unions that implied an increase of 206 euros per month for lawyers.
"It is one of the bodies that has had the highest salary increase in this legislature," said the head of Justice in a speech in Congress last week.
