Whilst the members of the local government of Torrevieja were keen to show their support for the staff at Torrevieja Hospital when the regional government was run by the PSOE-led coalition, now the PP are in power in Valencia it has fallen on the local socialists to offer their backing for the strike set to take place by medical staff frustrated by the failures of the promises made to them.
The Socialist Party of Torrevieja has stated its support for the Works Committee of the Department of Health and demands full compliance with the agreement to end the strike by the staff of the Torrevieja University Hospital.
A few months ago, the Committee signed an agreement with the Department of Botanicals whose objective was to try to gradually equalise the working conditions of statutory and labour personnel who, after the reversal, are very different despite carrying out the same tasks. However, the current PP and Vox government has stated that it considers the agreement to be null and void because it lacks a budget and anticipates that it will not comply with it.
The socialist spokesperson, Bárbara Soler, has defended the agreement, ensuring that it is binding because it was negotiated and signed with the Ministry, not with a political party, and the opposite would imply proceeding against the autonomous administration’s own actions. Furthermore, the agreement was ratified before a Labour Arbitration Court and registered, which would provide it with the same effectiveness as a Collective Agreement according to reiterated jurisprudence of the Supreme Court.
Likewise, she has expressed her surprise at the fact that the PP of Torrevieja has not yet publicly positioned itself on the side of the workers as it did on other occasions and has stated that Eduardo Dolón must make use of his privileged position in Valencia to defend the interests of the municipality and demand compliance with the agreement in its entirety “because this is not a partisan issue but rather the rights of the workers and the quality of care of patients throughout area 22 depend on it, which will be seriously diminished.” “If these professionals go on strike or even if they freely decide to look for another destination, which would be a tragedy taking into account their extensive experience and career and the patent lack of health personnel.”
Soler maintains that the new autonomous government’s pretext for not complying with the agreement “is unaffordable for any citizen” and adds that “that figure can be taken from any item, since there is even one for various expenses and we are talking about a negligible sum in “in relation to a Department that manages a budget of more than eight and a half billion euro.”
For the spokesperson, the excuse is crude and unacceptable, since this new government “came to fix everything, but what it has done is start by dismantling what was working, including the agreements reached on health, due to mere political sectarianism.” According to Soler, “nobody thinks that this was on the table in hospitals like La Fe or the Clínic, why in Torrevieja? Are we too far from Valencia for our quality of care to matter?”
In this sense, Bárbara Soler recalled that this is not the only cut that is intended to be made in the health field in our municipality, since the investment for the expansion of the Hospital “has practically disappeared” and points out that this is a very serious fact taking into account the overwhelming growth that the population is expected to have with the construction of thousands of new homes in which citizens will live “who, simply, cannot be provided with quality public healthcare.” This consequence would not be unforeseen, because, she warns, “this is how the right works, it makes brutal cuts and sits back to be able to say later that the public does not work” and assures that “it cannot be announced with great fanfare that the first measure in the government is the elimination of certain taxes that only affect the highest incomes and then say that there is no budget to ensure the quality of care of citizens who use public health.”
The socialist ended up pointing out that, ultimately, “what is missing is neither a report nor money, what is missing is only the political will to comply with an agreement that is legal, fair and totally viable.”
For all these reasons, the Socialist Party of Torrevieja has offered its solidarity and support to the workers and the Works Committee and has announced that it has begun conversations with the corresponding regional deputies so that compliance is forcefully demanded.
