Argentina's Macri vetoes anti-layoffs law. [View all]
Source: Buenos Aires Herald
Argentine President Mauricio Macri yesterday vetoed the Emergency Labor Law passed by Congress. The veto was widely anticipated, with Macri having repeatedly vowed to veto this first significant piece of legislation passed by Congress that his administration opposed.
The bill was passed on Thursday by the Lower House yesterday with 147 votes in favor, three votes against and 88 abstentions by the right-wing 'Let’s Change' coalition. A two-thirds majority (172 votes) is necessary override a veto in the Lower House. Although the opposition in the Senate has close to a two-thirds majority, the margins are smaller in the Lower House.
The bill, which had the backing of unions concerned over dismissals in both the public and private sectors, imposed double severance for laid-off workers for 180 days. An estimated 155,000 have been laid off in Argentina since Macri imposed austerity measures by decree just days after taking office in December. A 40% devaluation has meanwhile caused inflation to double to 42% according to private estimates, leading to an erosion in purchasing power of nearly 20%.
Arguing that anti-layoff provisions are counterproductive because they can limit new investment, Macri defended the veto and listed a number of policies his administration has implemented since he took office. “There are over one million more kids reached by family allowances, new benefits for pensioners, the reimbursement of value added tax on the basic goods, among others.”
While the CGT labor federation did not publicly comment yesterday, the more combative CTA responded to the veto with a vow to organize a national strike and underlining that an “immediate response” is required. CTA leader Pablo Micheli and rival Hugo Yasky of the CTA de los Trabajadores have been working together on the legislation and yesterday reiterated that they would be joining forces to plan the strike. The leadership of the three CGT factions, which also supported the bill, are set to meet next week in order to agree on a unified response.
The populist Justicialist Party (Peronist) opposition remains divided in various factions without a clear leader however. Nevertheless, a statement issued by the Justicialist Party made it clear that Macri's first veto did not sit well. “President Macri, just as he vetoed over 100 laws approved by the City Legislature when he was mayor of Buenos Aires, has once again used the prerogative of a veto to ignore popular will and is denying workers the benefit of job stability.” Labor lawyer Héctor Recalde, chair of the Victory Front (FpV) caucus in the Lower House, challenged the veto and said that the “president was going to the suffer the veto of workers.”
Read more: http://buenosairesherald.com/article/214714/macri-vetoes-%E2%80%98antilayoffs%E2%80%99-law
At least the IMF's happy.
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