Staff without the consent of the Consulates General of Spain in London, Manchester and Edinburgh and the Spanish Embassy in the United Kingdom continue to support The strike was called indefinitely last Monday, March 14th.
This measure, approved by the majority of workers, comes after months of negotiations with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs The group’s demands did not receive the expected response. Workers have been denouncing for months the precarious situation they find themselves in, which has been exacerbated by the impact of Brexit on the British economy.
Among the demands, the group calls for a salary update that corrects Huge loss of purchasing power Resulting from thirteen years of freezing, which is equivalent to the cumulative inflation from 2008 to 2021, currently arising from Brexit and reaching its maximum in the past thirty years.
In addition, workers deplore that many colleagues are below the minimum wage for professionals set in the UK. It seems inconsistent for us that the current government agrees The minimum wage for professionals in Spain is rising And it does not respect other countries’ minimum occupational wages, allowing some workers in the Spanish administration abroad to be below the poverty line”, point out the group’s sources. “We feel that the Spanish ministry and administration have generally abandoned them, we are a reference point for thousands of Spanish citizens in the UK After Brexit, we don’t even have a deal that protects us.”
Through the website change.org, workers have started a set of signatures denouncing the “bad management of the UK’s Foreign, European Union and Cooperation Department, such as As a result of arbitrary wounds that made the services provided to citizens risky, as well as the working conditions of its employees.”
According to sources from the group, the terrible working conditions of the workers directly affect the service provided to the citizen, which has increased exponentially after the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union. “In the past year alone, 21 workers quit their jobs permanently. Until these places are replaced (a process that takes several months), the work falls on the shoulders of the rest of the workers, who cannot cope. By the time the place is filled, another fellow has already left and the process repeats.”
More than 2,500 Morsey residents are in the UK according to the National Institute of Statistics
According to data from the National Institute of Statistics, there are about 2,600 Morse nationals currently residing in the United Kingdom, although the data provided by the British authorities raise this number significantly. The main actions that citizens are asking for are Renewal of the passport and its registration in the consular civil registry. These same sources indicate that “we are not enough workers to meet the demand and there are thousands of citizens waiting for an appointment, Brexit has led to an avalanche.”
Despite everything, it does not seem that resolving the situation of workers and citizens is one of the priorities of the Government of Spain or the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. After two weeks of indefinite strike, there was no move by the establishments to defuse the situation. “The only thing showing this indifference is Institutional abandonment Which before we find ourselves denouncing it for years. There are thousands of citizens who need more consular services due to Brexit, but both the need of these citizens and the precarious situation of the workers do not matter in Madrid,” the workers resigned to admit.
“We know the time chosen is not ideal, but on the 1st of April the UK financial year begins and many of us will not be able to cope with, say, higher energy prices (the British government has announced a 54% increase) or higher rents. ‘, they explain from the group. “we need to Immediate solution or we will have to quit our jobswith the consequent harm to citizens who need the services of consulates and the embassy.”
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