Tourism and food workers will get nothing after the government’s announcements at the TIF, the Panhellenic Federation of Food Workers (POEET) complains.
“In tourism, with a turnover of 22 billion annually, in the hyper-profitable food industry, workers only get announcements and applause. In reality, they will get nothing at the TIF,” the Federation states characteristically.
As it points out, “at this year’s TIF, the Prime Minister again handed out promises and figures for “development”, for “strengthening the middle class” and for tax cuts. For the thousands of workers in Tourism and Food, who turn the wheel of the country’s most profitable industry, no mention”, criticizing the absence of mention of the reinstatement of the Collective Bargaining Agreements and the determination of the minimum wage by the social partners and warning that there will be mobilizations by the unions on the issue of the 13-hour workday.
POEET emphasizes that the government’s agenda does not contain a single answer to its demands, which are…
• Unemployment benefit that covers all months, not a three-month tip.
• Housing for seasonal workers, “because we cannot sleep in warehouses when hotels are recording record turnovers”.
• Universal implementation of the Collective Bargaining Agreements with real controls and sanctions.
• Reinstatement of lump sum and BAE for those working in conditions of wear and tear and exhaustion.
• Return of the lump sum in 20 years as it was in force, decades before the Katrougalos law.
• Maternity benefit. “While the problem of low birth rates plagues our country, the Government continues to exclude seasonal workers from maternity benefits, preventing a maid, a waitress, a laundress from starting a family.”
