In the middle of the legislative discussion of the project that expands and improves the benefits of the Employment Protection Law, parliamentarians entered a indication that seeks to extend the validity of the regulations, something that the Government “is evaluating”.
The amendment, proposed by the Senate Finance Committee, seeks to empower the Ministry of Labor to extend the term of benefits and benefits established in the legislation, under the terms and conditions currently established, for a maximum period of five months.
In this way, the validity of the law, which began to take effect last April and ends next October, could then be extended until March 2021, maintaining the replacement rate, set at 55 percent.
From the Government, the Minister of Economy, Lucas Palacios, acknowledged that they are studying extending the Employment Protection Law, which to date has benefited more than 700,000 workers affected by the coronavirus pandemic.
“This very deep health and economic crisis that we are experiencing and that has generated tremendous unemployment forces us to put all the tools we have available on the table to be able to recover those jobs, “said the Secretary of State.
“We have had conversations with the unions and We are evaluating how long we can postpone the Employment Protection Law and under what conditions. That will be released soon, in the next few days, “he said.
Palacios explained that the extension of the benefits “is under evaluation because there are several ways in which this delay can be done. Technically there are several alternatives, but we have taken into consideration all points of view of the unions, because these tools are for the people “.
Guilds: “It is absolutely necessary”
According to the last balance of the Superintendency of Pensions, 706,795 people are with their contract suspended, under the Employment Protection Law, with commerce, construction and tourism the items most affected by the crisis.
Faced with this scenario, different unions asked the Government to extend the regulations if this indication is approved.
The president of the Multigremial Nacional de Emprendedores, Juan Pablo Swett, stressed that “is Absolutely necessary extend the Employment Protection Law, since the crisis that we were initially thought to have would last only three months and probably last between eight and 10 months. “
If the extension does not materialize until 2021, the union leader warned, “There are probably 800,000 Chileans who will increase the number of unemployed that the INE gives us monthly.”
Along the same lines, the president of the Federation of Tourism Companies of Chile (Fedetur), Ricardo Margulis, alerted that “The situation is quite dire.”
“As of January this year, there were 600,000 people working in tourism activities. In the last employment report, there are just under 300,000, that is, tourism lost half of its jobs in the first half. Of those 300,000, there are 120,000 who are covered by the Employment Protection Law. If the law is not prolonged, these people will not be able to go back to work“, exposed El Diario de Cooperativa.
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