At midnight on December 14, 1988, workers at Televisión Española cut the broadcast. The blackout announced a general strike that would empty factories and offices and force the Government of Felipe González to abandon its youth contract project. Almost four decades later, the 11N general strike recovers that ability to bring a problem affecting an entire generation to the workplace. In 1988, it was about the conditions of the first job. This Wednesday, it's about the cost of paying for a home even when one has a job.
The mobilization that ignited after the eviction of Maricarmen Abascal is the first 24-hour general strike jointly called by Comisiones Obreras (CCOO) and the Unión General de Trabajadoras y Trabajadores (UGT) since 2012. It is driven by the tenant movement and brings together labor unions and neighborhood collectives. This alliance has precedents. Some of the greatest labor conquests in Spain began precisely when people from other trades, other companies, and other cities made their own a fight that had started far from their workplace.
From the eight hours of "La Canadiense" to the miners who stood up to Franco
In February 1919, billing employees of the electricity company known as "La Canadiense" stopped working to demand the reinstatement of several dismissed colleagues. The strike, promoted by the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT), spread to textiles and other electricity, gas, and water companies. The stoppage affected trams, lighting, and a large part of Barcelona's industry. The Government mobilized the Army and thousands of strikers ended up imprisoned in Montjuïc.
The negotiation secured wage improvements and the reinstatement of those dismissed. The protest resumed in March as prisoners remained to be released. The decree of April 3, 1919 extended the main achievement beyond Barcelona. It generally set a maximum of eight hours a day or 48 hours a week from October 1. Saturday was still a working day, but a conflict that had started in the offices of an electric company had legally changed the working day in Spain.
In April 1962, seven miners fired from the Nicolasa pit in Mieres ignited the protest in the Asturian coalfields. One of them, Eladio Gueimonde, would recall decades later why they stopped. "We wanted more money and better conditions; the mine was inhumane." The Huelgona (Big Strike) spread to workplaces in 27 other provinces. The women of the coalfields sustained the strike with resistance funds, food distribution, and pickets. Franco's regime responded with arrests and declared a state of emergency in Asturias, Biscay, and Gipuzkoa.
The dictatorship ended up negotiating. The seven dismissed workers returned to their jobs, and the mining workforces managed to have part of the increase in coal prices allocated to improving their wages. That struggle strengthened the workers' networks that were reorganizing under the dictatorship. In 1978, the Constitution recognized in its article 28.2 the fundamental right of workers to strike to defend their interests.
14D stopped the youth contract and 20J made Aznar backtrack
The union unity that marked December 14, 1988, had been missed three years earlier. In 1985, CCOO mobilized against pension reform without the support of UGT, and the Government maintained the increase in the required years of contributions. In 1988, Nicolás Redondo and Antonio Gutiérrez, leading UGT and CCOO, called for a joint strike. The Executive's plan envisioned temporary contracts for young people aged 16 to 25, with the minimum wage as a reference and strong bonuses for companies. The unions also demanded extended unemployment protection and improved pensions and salaries for public employees.
Millions of workers supported the strike. The youth contract was not implemented, and subsequent negotiations brought improvements for pensioners and the legal recognition of collective bargaining for public employees in 1990. That same year, non-contributory retirement and disability pensions were approved, extending protection to people without sufficient contributions. A strike that had started over entry conditions to the labor market ended up opening a negotiation on how the benefits of economic growth were distributed.
On June 20, 2002, CCOO and UGT went on strike again against the "decretazo" (decree-law) of José María Aznar's Government. The norm hardened the conditions for retaining unemployment benefits if an offer considered adequate was rejected and had suppressed, in a good part of unfair dismissals, the processing wages. These are the wages that compensate for the salary lost between the dismissal and the judicial resolution. The Government estimated participation at 16%. That day, electricity demand fell by more than 20%, an indicator of the slowdown in activity that was especially noticeable in industry, construction, and transport.
In July, Aznar replaced the Minister of Labor, Juan Carlos Aparicio, with Eduardo Zaplana. After negotiating with the unions, the Executive reinstated processing wages in December and softened some of the conditions imposed on the unemployed. The rectification was partial. In 2007, a second outcome arrived, through judicial channels. The Constitutional Court annulled the original decree because the Government had not justified the urgency necessary to approve it through that route.
From strikes against cuts to 11N for housing
The strikes of the financial crisis had another outcome. The one on September 29, 2010, did not stop José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero's labor reform. On March 29, 2012, the first major strike against Mariano Rajoy's Government also failed to achieve the withdrawal of the reform that generalized the 33-day per year compensation for unfair dismissal. On November 14, Spain and Portugal went on strike again in a European day against austerity. The reform remained in place and hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets against the cuts.
The closest precedent to 11N in terms of organization is March 8, 2018. The feminist movement brought issues to the strike that rarely came together at a negotiating table, such as the wage gap and the distribution of care work. CNT and CGT called a 24-hour strike, and CCOO and UGT, a two-hour strike per shift. The protest extended to homes, classrooms, and consumption. Today, it is the tenant unions that have brought to the workplaces a demand that had been organizing in the neighborhoods for years.
Coincidence matters for those considering stopping. Losing a day's wages weighs more when rent takes a good part of the paycheck. And getting a salary increase is of little use if the next renewal of the housing contract eats it all up. Hence, 11N calls on employers for wages and administrations for housing. This Thursday, the Standing Committee of Congress will vote separately on the two housing decrees, with measures on the extension of leases, the suspension of certain evictions, and compensation to the tenant in some cases of non-renewal. The negotiation of the new wage agreement with the employers is still pending.
Contact
We are listening. Get in touch.
