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In October 2002, the regional government of Navarre in Spain and the CC.OO trade union signed an agreement to promote stable recruitment and reduce temporary employment. This pioneering agreement reinforces the systems of control of temporary recruitment and promotes collective bargaining on the conversion of temporary contracts into open-ended ones.
In late October 2002, the Ministry of Labour of the Navarre region (autonomous community) and the regional organisation of the Trade Union Confederation of Workers’ Commissions (Comisiones Obreras, CC.OO) signed an agreement to promote stable recruitment and reduce the rate of temporary employment in Navarre, which stands at about 25.3% of all employment.
The agreement runs for a period of one year and focuses on the companies with the highest volume of temporary employment: around 1,000 companies, representing 75% of the companies in Navarre with workforces of between 10 and 200 employees, in which 50% of the temporary contracts are concentrated.
The aim of this agreement is to foster collective bargaining as a basic tool for promoting the use of open-ended employment contracts and eliminating the excessive use and abuse of temporary recruitment. To achieve this, the companies with the highest rates of temporary recruitment will be selected and a campaign will offer information and raise awareness on the current regulations concerning recruitment, and on the advisability of transforming temporary contracts into open-ended ones. Trade union delegates and workers' committees will also receive this information and will be advised on the types of contract available. The agreement also aims to promote greater control of recruitment and inspection of fraud. To achieve this, a system will be established to monitor the observance of the current regulations and to determine whether the Labour Inspectorate (Inspección de Trabajo) should intervene. Finally, the agreement gives special attention to the construction sector, in which there is a high rate of unstable employment and chains of subcontracting.
The signatories to the agreement state that it is important because, for the first time, it establishes a framework of consensus between the regional government and the trade unions to reinforce the mechanisms aimed at controlling fraud in temporary recruitment, and it promotes collective bargaining as a means of consolidating open-ended recruitment. The measures aimed at increasing the control of recruitment and fraud will be complemented by information and awareness-raising measures aimed at both companies and workers' representatives in order to promote bargaining in this area.